iHeart Retains Top Spot in Podtrac May Rankings

RADIO ONLINE | Tuesday, June 9, 2026 | 3:02pm CT

Podtrac

Podtrac's latest podcast industry rankings show iHeart continuing to dominate the U.S. podcast landscape, while audience growth was widespread across the industry in May 2026.

According to Podtrac's Top U.S. Podcast Publishers & Networks ranking, iHeart Audience Network remained the nation's largest podcast publisher and network, reaching 63.1 million unique monthly listeners and generating more than 300.7 million downloads and streams during May. iHeartPodcasts held the No. 2 position with 33.8 million unique monthly listeners and 164 million downloads and streams.

NPR Sales Network ranked third with 19.7 million unique monthly listeners, followed by Libsyn and Vox Media.

Podtrac reported that three publishers in the rankings posted month-over-month gains in downloads during May, while 16 of the 19 ranked participants increased their unique monthly audience compared to April.

Rounding out the Top 10 publishers and networks were The Walt Disney Company, PodcastOne, Fox Audio Network, DailyWire and Paramount.

In the Top U.S. Podcasts ranking, The Daily from The New York Times moved up one spot to claim the No. 1 position, overtaking NPR News Now, which slipped to second. NPR's Up First remained third, while Dateline NBC and Fox News Hourly Update completed the Top Five.

Other notable movements included On Purpose with Jay Shetty climbing two places to No. 11, The Shawn Ryan Show rising four spots to No. 13, and NPR's Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! making the largest gain in the Top 20, jumping 22 positions to No. 18.