Podcast ad spending rose 23% year over year in the second quarter, per Magellan AI’s latest benchmark report, with Insurance the fastest-growing vertical and ad load hitting a new high, even as growth decelerated slightly from recent quarters.
The report, which analyzed 94,823 episodes, saw spend grow 9% from the first quarter, with every month in Q2, April, May, and June, outpacing Q1’s monthly average. The 23% year-over-year figure marks a step down from the 28% and 32% growth rates Magellan reported in the two quarters prior.
The top 10 podcast advertisers spent an estimated $128 million in Q2, down 2% from Q1 despite the overall market’s growth, suggesting spending is spreading beyond the biggest names. Quince led the quarter at $19 million, followed by Shopify, BetterHelp, Toyota, and Amazon. Progressive and SimpliSafe were the only new entrants to the top 10, while eight of the 10 spenders also ranked in Q1’s top 10.
Insurance was the fastest-growing category, with quarterly spend jumping 60% from Q1 to $58.2 million, up 84% year over year, led by Progressive, State Farm, and UnitedHealth Group. Financial Services remained the largest category overall at $114.4 million, up 12% year over year.
Ad load climbed to 8.75% of episode time in Q2, up from 8.25% in Q1 and 8.11% a year earlier. The increase was driven entirely by advertiser ad load, which rose 17.8% year over year, even as ads promoting other podcasts continued to shrink as a share of episode time. Sports saw one of the sharpest genre increases, with ad load climbing from 7.77% in Q2 2025 to 9.11% this quarter.
Magellan counted 1,297 brands advertising on podcasts for the first time in Q2, spending an average of $31,400 each, mostly on mid-roll placements averaging 51 seconds. Sports was the most popular genre among new advertisers, included in 18% of new brands’ media plans.
Shows simulcast on YouTube also outperformed audio-only podcasts on several measures. Simulcasts carried a higher ad load (8.35% versus 8.06%), a larger share of host-read ads (43% versus 34%), and a notably higher renewal rate among direct-response advertisers (44% versus 34%).
Magellan’s Q1 2026 report found host-read ads outperformed produced and programmatic spots on response rate.
