Google Podcasts is shutting down

Justin Jackson: Hey, welcome to the
first episode of a Podcast Industry News.

In today's news, Google
Podcasts is shutting down.

Google Podcasts users received an email
today indicating that the listening

app, which was just launched five years
ago, will be shutting down in 2024.

Google plans to migrate all of
these users to YouTube music.

This aligns with Google's recent push
to integrate podcasts into the platform.

which began supporting
podcasts earlier this year.

Many Android users were
surprised by the announcement.

Google Podcasts has been around
since 2018 and was pre installed

on Android devices, but for some
reason inside Google's search app.

So despite Google Podcasts accumulating
over 500 million downloads since its

launch, it never captured a significant
share of the podcast listening market.

From Transistor's podcast hosting data,
We can see that just over 2 percent of all

downloads occurred on Google Podcasts, and
data from Edison reveals that 23 percent

of weekly podcast users in the US prefer
YouTube as their go to service compared to

just 4 percent of Google Podcasts users.

Still, Google's podcast strategy
feels like it's all over the place.

Back in May of 2020, Google
announced that Google Podcasts would

be replacing Google Play Music.

Do you remember when you could listen
to podcasts in Google Play Music?

They said in the announcement, with
this transition, we encourage podcast

listeners to transfer their subscriptions
and episode progress to Google Podcasts,

our dedicated podcast player available
for free on Android, iOS, and web.

Fast forward just three years, and
Google is once again asking millions

of its users to switch their podcasts
from Google Podcasts to YouTube Music.

So now with the tech giant placing
its podcast bets on YouTube Music,

we'll see if this pans out better.

Then there are other podcast bets.

That's all for today's episode
of Podcast Industry News.

This is a brand new show and we
appreciate you subscribing or following

in your favorite app, including
at least for now, Google Podcasts.

We also appreciate reviews in Apple
podcasts and Spotify and on YouTube.

I'm Justin Jackson.

I've been your host.

You can visit us on the
web at podcastindustry.org.