Best podcasting newsletters for podcasters to read
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The best podcasting newsletters for podcasters do one of two jobs: tell you what happened in the industry today, or explain what it means for the business of your show. Podnews and Podcast Business Journal handle the first. Sounds Profitable, Scrappy Podcasting, and Pod Pointers handle the second.
This page is about newsletters worth reading. If you are looking to build an email list around your own podcast, that is a different job, and our guide to podcast newsletters as an audience channel covers it.
How we selected these newsletters
We read each publisher's current official site and compared them on the things that decide whether a subscription survives a month:
- Frequency, and whether that cadence matches how closely you need to follow the industry.
- Focus, since news, advertising research, and show-growth tactics are different subjects.
- Who publishes it, because ownership shapes coverage.
- Cost, and what sits behind any paid tier.
- Reading time, which is the real cost of a daily subscription.
We have not ranked these on writing quality, which is a matter of taste. All five are free to subscribe to at the time of writing.
Quick comparison
| Newsletter | Frequency | Focus | Publisher |
|---|---|---|---|
| Podnews | Weekday daily | Industry news, events, jobs | Podnews LLC |
| Sounds Profitable | Weekly, Tuesday | Business and advertising, plus research | Bryan Barletta and Tom Webster |
| Podcast Business Journal | Weekly, Friday | Business interviews, news, data | Podnews LLC |
| Scrappy Podcasting | Daily | Monetising small expertise-led shows | Podcast Marketing Academy |
| Pod Pointers | Not stated | Making sense of the industry | The Podcast Host |
1. Podnews
What it is: Podnews is a free daily briefing on podcasting and on-demand audio, published every weekday by Podnews LLC. Its site states "Join 33,513 readers worldwide" and describes its remit as a truly global view of the sector, including podcast events and jobs.
Why it stands out: It is the closest thing the industry has to a paper of record. Platform changes, measurement standards, hosting announcements, and shutdowns show up here first, which is why most other coverage cites it. The daily edition is short enough to read with coffee.
Price: Free. Podnews is supported by industry sponsors listed on the site at gold and silver tiers.
Who it is for: Every podcaster who wants to know when something changes at Apple, Spotify, or YouTube before a sponsor asks about it. If you subscribe to one thing on this list, make it this.
2. Sounds Profitable
What it is: Sounds Profitable describes itself as "a collection of media properties, a newsletter, a podcast, and much more, that covers both strategic and tactical changes to the business of podcasting". It runs a weekly Tuesday newsletter, a daily show called The Download, and Deep Dives walkthroughs of industry tools. It is run by Bryan Barletta and Tom Webster.
Why it stands out: The original research. Sounds Profitable publishes studies such as The Podcast Atlas, The Podcast Discovery Playbook 2026, and The Advertising Landscape UK, and makes them available publicly at no charge. That output is where a lot of the sourced numbers in podcast advertising conversations originate.
Price: Free, including the research reports.
Who it is for: Anyone selling advertising, pitching sponsors, or trying to understand how buyers think. Pair it with our podcast advertising guide if you are new to the sell side.
3. Podcast Business Journal
What it is: Podcast Business Journal has covered the business side of podcasting since 2018 through news, interviews and industry data. Its free newsletter goes out every Friday with interviews from the business of podcasting alongside the week's news and data, and the site states more than 13,000 people subscribe.
Why it stands out: The interview format gives you people talking about decisions rather than press releases describing them. A Friday cadence also works differently from a daily: it arrives when you have time to read something longer than a headline.
Price: Free.
Who it is for: Podcasters thinking about the commercial side, especially anyone running more than one show. Note that Podnews LLC publishes both this and Podnews, so the two overlap more than the different names suggest.
4. Scrappy Podcasting
What it is: Scrappy Podcasting is a daily newsletter from Podcast Marketing Academy, billed as a daily two-minute schematic on podcast revenue strategy. Its stated focus is designing a show that drives significant revenue from a few hundred downloads, aimed at coaching, consulting, education, and content businesses.
Why it stands out: It argues from the opposite end of the usual advice. Most growth content assumes bigger downloads are the goal, and this one starts from the premise that a small, precisely targeted audience can be worth more than a large general one.
Price: Free.
Who it is for: Consultants, coaches, and B2B podcasters whose show exists to generate business rather than ad revenue. Less relevant if your monetisation plan is sponsorship at scale.
5. Pod Pointers
What it is: Pod Pointers is the newsletter from The Podcast Host, which has published podcasting education since 2007 alongside the Podcraft podcast, courses, and its Indie Pod community. The sign-up describes the newsletter as a way to make sense of the podcasting industry. The site does not state a frequency or subscriber count.
Why it stands out: The Podcast Host writes for independent podcasters, not for the industry that sells to them, and the surrounding library covers planning, equipment, editing, interviewing, and promotion.
Price: Free.
Who it is for: Newer podcasters who want practical craft advice more than industry news. The absence of a published frequency means you should try it for a month before deciding where it fits.
Reading the industry without drowning in it
Two subscriptions beat six. Take one daily for news and one weekly or research-led for depth, then give it a month before adding anything.
Watch for shared ownership while you are choosing, because reading the same editorial perspective twice is easy to mistake for independent confirmation.
Read for the mechanism, not the headline number. When a newsletter reports that ad load reached a new high or that a platform changed how it counts a play, the useful question is what that changes in your own reporting. We did exactly that with the Q2 ad spend and ad load figures, where the interesting part was the gap between demand growth and supply growth rather than either number on its own.
Then check the claim against your own show. Industry averages describe a market you are one row in, and the only benchmark that settles an argument with a sponsor is your own delivery over a window you can name. Our podcast marketing guide covers turning that reading into something you actually do.
Want help turning industry noise into a plan for your show? Book a free podcast growth strategy call.
FAQ
How many podcasting newsletters should I subscribe to?
Two is usually right: one daily for news and one weekly or research-led for depth. Podnews plus Sounds Profitable covers most of what an independent show needs. Adding five more does not make you better informed, it just makes the inbox easier to ignore.
Are these newsletters free?
The five here all offer a free subscription, and Sounds Profitable also publishes its research reports publicly at no charge. Some publishers sell sponsorships, jobs listings, or paid tiers alongside the free edition, which is worth knowing when you read coverage of a company that also advertises.
What is the difference between reading a newsletter and running one?
Everything on this page is about staying informed. Building an email list around your own show is a separate job with separate tools, covered in our guide to podcast newsletters as an audience channel.
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