Rachel Maddow And ‘Dateline’ Push NBC News Into Top Tier Of Podcast Producers

Boosted by hit podcasts like Murder & Magnolias and The Seduction, NBC News in December jumped ahead of The New York TimesNYT
to become the fourth-largest podcast producer in the U.S., according to podcast industry rankings published by Podtrac. NBC’s rapidly-expanding portfolio of podcasts reached more than 10 million unique listeners in December, behind only iHeartPodcasts (30.4 million), Wondery (22.5 million) and NPR (18.3 million.)

NBC had six podcasts that reached #1 on the AppleAAPL
podcasts list: Tiffany Dover Is Dead*, Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra and four podcasts from Dateline NBC: The Seduction, Missing in America, Internal Affairs, and Murder & Magnolias.

The December podcast ranking comes as NBC had its best year ever for podcasts, with a combined 63 million monthly downloads—up 24% from 2021. December also marked NBC’s 16th straight month with more than 50 million downloads.

SubstackEpisode 1: Keith Morrison, ‘Dateline NBC’

For NBC, podcasting—where true crime is one of the most popular subjects—was a gift: a chance for Dateline NBC to bring its true crime stories to an entirely different audience and in an entirely different way. Keith Morrison’s The Seduction told the story of a 2008 murder case complete with twists and double-crosses. In contrast, Rachel Maddow’s Ultra takes listeners back to the 1940s, unspooling a tale of extremists aiming to overthrow the U.S. government.

MORE FROM FORBES‘It’s How The System Works’: ‘Dateline NBC’ Investigates Man’s Wrongful ConvictionBy Mark Joyella

Overall, The New York Times’ The Daily was the top-rated podcast in December—its 50th month at #1—followed by Wondery’s Morbid and NBC’s Dateline NBC. Fox News’ Fox News Hourly Update jumped two spots to #12, and CNN’s CNN 5 Things climbed one spot into 15th place.