What happened when U.S Latino non-listeners tried podcasts
By edison
By Director of Research Gabe Soto
Today there are 116 million people older than 12 in the U.S. who listen to podcasts every month, or 41% of the total population. In the Infinite Dial Report by Edison Research and Triton Digital, that number increased rapidly by 12 million since 2020 and some of the biggest drivers behind that growth were Latinos.
Monthly podcast listenership among U.S. Latinos grew from 25% in 2020 to 36% in a matter of twelve months. This increase, of 44%, makes Latinos the fastest adopters of podcasts during the pandemic out any major racial/ethnic group. Yet, the majority of Latinos (64%), like the general population (59%), do not listen to podcasts.
This non-listening group was the central focus of our Latino Podcast (non) Listener Report that Edison Research published in September. We were curious to see what they thought about podcasts, so we asked them, on video. It was all an effort to understand what might usher in the next wave of podcast audience.
To begin, we put a group of Latinos who don’t listen to podcasts to the test by asking them if they could describe one to the best of their ability.
Then we played a podcast for them and asked them to share their thoughts.
Finally, we asked how they listen or watch other content in English vs. Spanish to understand how they might listen to podcasts.
The three videos revealed assumptions that podcast non-listeners make frequently, and how those assumptions are challenged after listening to one. The videos also illustrated the joy many Latinos have when listening to podcast content that is relevant to them, and how this has been and will continue to be a factor in current and future podcast adoption rates as the industry continues to amplify podcasts for diverse audiences.
