Spotify expands its video podcasts feature to creators in more than 180 countries. Now, in addition to hearing the voices of the participants, you will also be able to see their expressions and the entire stage they have set up. This integration had already been in the testing phase for several years, since 2020 to be exact, and looks like it’s finally ready to launch.
Spotify’s new proposal can be used in all countries where Anchor, the podcast creation platform, is available. Let’s remember that Spotify bought this company a couple of years agoand since then it has been his main base for betting on this new audio and video format.
In early 2021, video podcasts came to Spotify for the first time. Nevertheless, at that time it was a very small test. Later, in April of this year, the market was opened to include the United States, and later some regions of Europe. Today, the global launch of video podcasts on Spotify cements its intention to compete with platforms like YouTube.
This is how podcasts with video work on Spotify
Spotify video podcasts are available on any device where you can download the app. Whether on your computer or on your mobile, you can choose if you want to add a more interactive layer to a format that we were already used to.
Likewise, creators will not be required to upload podcasts with video to Spotify as well. If they want, they can upload a podcast with video one week, and the next week upload just the audio. Depending on how much content is shown on camera, may give more priority to some episodes than others.
For example, as mentioned from TechCrunchepisodes like An Abortion Story of the program Call Her Daddy urges listeners to turn on video at certain parts of the episode. This way, they can see details that are sometimes missed by going with audio only.
One of the best news is that video podcasts on Spotify support background playback. This way, you can continue watching the video even if you have to respond to a conversation. This function is also found on YouTube; However, the latter requires us to pay a considerable sum to be able to access it.
The party is over for YouTube: Spotify’s bet makes it a serious competitor
Until now, the world of podcasts was divided between several platforms. If you wanted to listen to a podcast on your way to work, Apple Podcasts or Spotify were the main options. Others, like Deezer, are also quite popular, but without reaching the level of those mentioned above.
If instead you wanted to watch the podcast as well as listen to it, YouTube was almost the only option available to do so. Thus, the company maintained a kind of monopoly over this very specific format within the podcasting sector.
This new Spotify announcement comes to change things. Now, the inclusion of video could catapult it even further, leaving YouTube relegated to a second option when it comes to podcasts.
YouTube refuses to sit idly by
Inside YouTube they don’t give up. The company has made several efforts to improve deals with popular podcasters. To do so, it hired podcast-focused executive Kai Chuk in the middle of last year. Since then, the company has even gone so far as to change its feed Main in the United States adding exclusive sections for podcasts at the beginning of the web.
Will Spotify be able to take the crown from YouTube in this sector? The answer, as always, is complicated. YouTube is still the king of video, and users always appreciate it when they can find all their content on one platform. Being able to jump from a cooking video to a comedy podcast is something you can’t do from Spotify. For this, the inclusion of videos on the platform might not make as significant a difference as we thought, but that remains to be seen.
In addition, the Swedish company has not revealed anything about the statistics obtained with its new video function. Whether in levels of creation or views, Spotify has only responded to these questions with the phrase “We are excited about the growthwithout giving much more detail.
Anchor, the Spotify platform, has recently confirmed that the company has reached 456 million listeners per month. An impressive amount, without a doubt. Soon, the new audiobook business will also be available to everyone on the platform, and the company is already working on implementing them worldwide.