The Top 50 Podcasts in the U.S. Q1 2026 from Edison Podcast Metrics
By Edison Research
Glen Mills, PA, USA, April 17, 2026 – Edison Research at SSRS announces the Top 50 Podcasts in the U.S. from Edison Podcast Metrics based on reach for the first quarter of 2026 among weekly podcast consumers ages 13+.
The Joe Rogan Experience, Crime Junkie, and The Daily top the list, as they did in Q4 2025. The top six shows remain in the same rank order as Q4, with other rank changes in the Top 10 noted below parenthetically. The full list of Top 50 podcasts is below.
The Joe Rogan Experience
Crime Junkie
The Daily
Call Her Daddy
Smartless
Stuff You Should Know
Dateline NBC (+2 rank positions since Q4 2025)
This Past Weekend with Theo Von
MrBallen Podcast: Strange, Dark & Mysterious Stories (+8 rank positions since Q4 2025)
New Heights with Jason & Travis Kelce
And the Award Goes To…
After winning the inaugural Golden Globe for Best Podcast in January 2026, Good Hang with Amy Poehler soars from 38th to 13th in one quarter, marking the second consecutive quarter the show has reached a record high. Other Golden Globe Best Podcast finalists that moved up the ranker: The Mel Robbins Podcast (+3), Up First (+1), and Armchair Expert (+12).
Notable Moves:
The Giggly Squad breaks into the top 50 for the first time. It won Best Podcast of the Year at the iHeart Podcast Awards in March 2026.
The Herd with Colin Cowherd hits a record high. Cowherd received criticism after launching an AI version of himself.
The Dan Bongino Show reenters the top 50. Bongino returned to podcasting in February after a stint as FBI deputy director.
Bubbling under: Rappers Joe and Jada reach 57th after climbing the ranks consistently since debuting in May 2025.
About Edison Podcast Metrics
The podcast show ranker is derived from data collected continuously during the first quarter of 2026, interviewing 5,163 weekly podcast consumers ages 13 and older in the U.S. Participants indicate which podcasts they listened to or watched in the past week along with a variety of demographic, psychographic, and purchase-behavior information. This ranker measures reach as a percentage of the weekly podcast audience.
For more information on how to become a subscriber to the full datasets, please contact info@edisonresearch.com.
