Recapping The Podcast Show London 2026
It was a busy week in London at The Podcast Show 2026. Here’s a quick rundown of stories from in and around the event. Sounds Profitable and Sound Insights debuted The Advertising Landscape U.K. Alexandra Forsyth has a new PodcastingToday opinion piece this week covering the event. The Podcast Standards Project gathered over 20 people together for an annual meetup, and has a blog covering topics discussed. Analyst Adam Bowie has shared his slide deck and key takeaways from his presentation Signals in the Static: A Data-Driven Guide to the Podcast Landscape. Sport Social Podcast Network has an in-depth piece covering the panel Podcasting Beyond Audio and Video: Unlocking the Full Ecosystem, hosted by SSPN Head of Agency Sales Chloe Yates. Speaking of event coverage, last week’s episode of Podnews Weekly Review was recorded live on stage during the conference. Meanwhile, elsewhere in the U.K. the Audio Academy announced the 2026 ARIAS winners, and YouTube announced a curated podcast homepage for the U.K.
RAJAR (Radio Joint Audience Research), the U.K. body responsible for measuring audio audiences, published the Spring edition of the MIDAS survey. Overall, 25% of people in the U.K. listen to podcasts weekly, a figure Podnews notes has remained relatively static since the Winter 2024 MIDAS survey. Podcasts command 6% of adults’ listening hours, over owned music (5%) and audiobooks (3%).
Today, Goalhanger launched Goalhanger Ventures, a new investment and partnership arm that will back “high-quality, creator-led media businesses with potential across video, social, audio, live and commercial platforms.” The official release notes Goalhanger Ventures’ first activity includes equity investment in Invisible Media, as well as funding and strategic support to grow Backyard Cricket.
Spotify is launching creator memberships and AI-generated podcasts
Tubefilter covers Spotify’s announcement of Memberships, a paid subscription service similar to YouTube’s Channel Memberships.In addition, the Personal Podcasts feature will let users prompt Spotify to generate a custom “podcast” episode with a synthetic voice discussing a topic. Spotify has also announced Articles, a new feature for Premium subscribers launching today that provides narrated recordings of over 650 long-form magazine articles. Articles are currently available in English in Spotify markets with audiobook access. Premium users have access to Articles using their monthly audiobook allowance, and Free users can purchase individual articles for $1.99 each.
As for the rest of the news…
- Audible has debuted an integration that allows active subscribers to link their account and access nearly 700 premium podcasts ad-free in Apple Podcasts, including former Wondery+ titles.
- Rain News covers Magellan AI’s top podcast advertiser rankers for April 2026.
- Staff at Futuro Media has voted to unionize under the Writers Guild of America East.
- True Native Media has a new blog on battling podcaster burnout.
- SpotsNow has launched its campaign planner for podcast advertising after nearly a year of research and development.
- Sport Social Podcast Network is celebrating its wins for Sales Team of the Year and Best Host Read Ad at the Campaign Audio Advertising Awards 2026.
- Yesterday’s episode of PodBiz features Flightpath CEO and founder Sean Howard discussing the challenge of forecasting ad delivery when audience behavior is unpredictable.
