According to newer data that Acast shared with Bloomberg, 180 shows have switched on video on Apple Podcasts, and listening on the platform for them has grown by roughly 25% since launch. Bloomberg reporter Ashley Carman reads this as those shows finding new audiences through video.
This is the first concrete sign of success for a feature that Apple launched precisely because its position among listeners is weakening.
A weakening position among listeners
The Podcast Download Spring 2026 survey, compiled by Cumulus Media and Signal Hill Insights, found that Apple Podcasts is named as the most used app by only 5% of weekly listeners. A year earlier it was 8%, Carman reports.
“It's not so much that Apple has lost a lot of share, but as the audience has grown, Apple has not continued to claim more new consumers choosing its platform,” said Paul Riismandel, president and CEO of Signal Hill Insights, in a webinar on the data, according to Carman. The podcast audience is growing, but Apple is not winning new listeners from that growth.
The whole market is pushing video in podcasts. The same report found that four months after Netflix entered podcasts, 62% of the weekly audience knew about it. Video is a response to where listening now happens, in a world flooded with clips and where pictures come before long-form audio.
What Apple launched
The new feature is built on HLS streaming technology and is available on iPhone, iPad and Apple Vision Pro through iOS, iPadOS and visionOS 26.4, and on the web. Listeners can switch between video and audio, download video for offline viewing, and the quality adapts to the network. Apple opened the feature to beta testing on 16 February 2026, and live operation began in the spring.
The hosting partners at launch were Acast, Amazon-owned ART19, Triton Omny Studio and SiriusXM.
Apple will charge for advertising in video
Apple does not charge hosts or creators, and wants to earn from advertising. “Apple will charge participating ad networks an impression-based fee for the delivery of dynamic ads in HLS video on Apple Podcasts starting later this year,” says the company's announcement. The video is also meant to keep the platform level with its largest competitors, Carman writes.
Early adoption runs through European hosting
The furthest along so far is Acast, a Swedish company headquartered in Stockholm and listed on Nasdaq Stockholm. By mid-May, 117 Acast shows that had released over 1,000 episodes had switched on video on Apple HLS, and the first video ad campaigns there were launched by State Farm and T-Mobile. According to Acast, 60% of the daily growth in HLS video comes from new listeners, and adding pictures to audio extends brands' reach by up to 39%.
Creators are interested as well. The waitlist for video at Transistor has passed 1,500 people, and the company has already brought in hundreds of them, co-founder and CEO Justin Jackson told Bloomberg.
What the data does not show yet
Whether Apple Podcasts will bring in entirely new users because of video remains unclear, Carman says. Video may, however, keep the existing audience on the platform for longer and increase the time people spend there.
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