The news: YouTube surpassed Spotify as the UK’s leading podcast platform, per Edison Research.

YouTube captured 29% of weekly listeners against Spotify's 28% among adults 15 and older, per PPC Land.

Fifteen percent of listeners choose BBC Sounds, and only 10% use Apple Podcasts.

This milestone mirrors a similar pattern in the US, where visual content is driving podcast engagement faster than audio-only formats. Forty percent of US consumers use YouTube to consume podcasts compared with 18% who use Spotify, per the Podcast Landscape 2025 report from Sounds Profitable and Signal Hill.

Zooming out: Various platforms are integrating podcast content—often in video format—to boost engagement and retain subscribers.

• Netflix is aggressively expanding into video podcasts; it recently brought popular shows like "The Breakfast Club", Jay Shetty’s "On Purpose", and Vox Media’s "Unexplainable" and "Switched On Pop" to its platform. 
• Platforms like Spotify, Amazon Music, and even TikTok are investing heavily in podcast infrastructure and exclusive content partnerships.

Implications for marketers: UK campaigns need a three-platform view, even though only YouTube and Spotify offer straightforward paid reach.

• YouTube and Spotify should anchor paid podcast plans because they provide the clearest path to scalable ad inventory. YouTube’s growing role also makes video podcast creative a priority for reach and engagement.
• BBC Sounds creates a paid-media blind spot. Advertisers can’t buy their way directly into that audience, so UK podcast plans need a separate influence strategy: PR, host or talent partnerships, and earned media can build relevance outside standard ad inventory.

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