Pew Research Center says that according to its study of the podcast landscape focusing on analyzing guests featured on top-ranked shows, “most top-ranked podcasts in 2022 (76%) brought on at least one guest, with over 7,000 people appearing on these shows.” Other findings include: 1) Podcasts about certain topics tend to have guests more often, including top-ranked sports (100%), entertainment (85%)
and politics (78%) shows. In addition, 89% of news-focused podcasts (across topics) brought on at least one guest in 2022; 2) Most podcasts aren’t bringing the same guests on over and over. More than 99% of all guests only appeared once on any top podcast in 2022. In addition, about half (49%) of top podcasts brought on at least one guest more than once, and 23% hosted more than five different people more than once. The most common guests represent a range of professional backgrounds, including entertainment figures, scientists, journalists and political commentators. Pew senior computational social scientist Galen Stocking comments, “Our research has shed light on the variety of topics and approaches within the podcasting landscape. Here, we found that most top-ranked podcasts are bringing on guests, and often from a wide range of professional backgrounds. This can add to the perspectives heard on each podcast.”
