Over the last decade, podcast listening has increased across all ages.

According to research done by the Pew Research Center, the percentage of people listening to podcasts has increased from 12% in 2013 to 42% in 2023.

With the increase in podcast listening, there has also been an uptick in podcasts being produced. The streaming platform Spotify has five million podcast titles.

University of Minnesota students, Sasha Kozachok and Taylor Effertz, have noticed the increase in podcasts.

Effertz knows numerous people who created a podcast for an assignment, for a club they are part of, or for fun.

People’s ability to create podcasts is easier than other forms of media because there is a low barrier to entering the podcasting world. Applications, such as Anchor, allow people to record podcasts wherever they are and upload them to platforms, such as Spotify.

Even Spotify has recently added features to make podcasting through Spotify better for both beginners and people who already have their podcasts started. These new features allow podcasters to customize their podcast page, get inside information on their analytics and explore more ways to get monetized.

Adjunct Professor Sarah Lemanczyk, who teaches classes on podcasting and multimedia journalism, has noticed an increase in the number of podcasts being created but not an increase in who is making money off of these podcasts.

“There’s a lot more people doing [podcasts], a lot more people making money off of them, but only 5% are really making sustainable money,” Lemanczyk said.

Regardless of if people are making money off podcasts, many people still want to create them.

“I think people want to get their voices heard,” Kozachok said.

Effertz echoed that idea and said everyone wants to have a platform now.

On a larger scale, newsrooms don’t necessarily produce podcasts to make money. Lemanczyk explained The New York Times podcast, “The Daily,” makes money because it broadcasts on public radio stations.

However, The Washington Post’s podcasts don’t make money in the same way: they are getting their content out to a group of people who may not have been paying attention to it at first.

“It’s about getting your content in front of a different audience that’s not used to seeing it,” Lemanczyk said.

Lemanczyk added Generation Z is the newly-prominent demographic for podcasts and said she thinks this is due to the fact Gen Z doesn’t associate specific content with specific mediums. For example, Gen Z can watch movies, listen to music and read a book without switching devices.

For Lemanczyk, she listens to the radio on an actual radio, but this “audio on demand,” as she referred to it, is what Lemanczyk loves about podcasting. It is part of what Gen Z has grown up with.

“You’re used to having the content you want, when you want it, who wouldn’t want that?” Lemanczyk said.

While many podcasters struggle to make money, creators still want a platform to express their opinions. Podcasting is not a new medium, however, it is continuing to grow everyday.