Royals Unscripted podcast Launches From the Daily Express

The Daily Express has launched its own weekly royal show. The Royals Unscripted podcast, a new video series dedicated to the Royal Family, debuted on Thursday, October 1, with episodes going out every Thursday morning, according to publisher Reach plc.

The show is hosted by Emily Ferguson, the Express's royal editor, alongside Express columnist Carole Malone. New episodes will be released weekly on YouTube, Spotify and Apple Podcasts, with a dedicated YouTube channel carrying the video version. According to Reach, the show had already gathered more than 5,200 subscribers ahead of its official debut.

Each 30-minute episode takes on the week's three biggest royal headlines. Ferguson brings what the publisher describes as exclusive stories sourced from her extensive royal contacts, while Malone offers the candid commentary her readers know. The show closes with a fashion segment from Royal Fashion Reporter Alicia Liberty, who breaks down the Royal Family's latest looks and shows viewers how to recreate them without the royal price tag.

The hosts know the royal beat

Ferguson has led the Express's royal coverage for years, reporting on the family's engagements at home and abroad and travelling with royals on official tours. The podcast gives her a standing weekly slot to go beyond what fits in print. "I'm really excited to be hosting Royals Unscripted and sitting down with Carole each week for the sharp, candid commentary her fans know and love," Ferguson said in the announcement. "Together we'll get behind the headlines and discuss what's really going on at the Palace and beyond."

She framed the launch as a response to demand. "When the appetite for royal coverage is at an all-time high, I can't wait to bring my unique insight from the royal beat and delve deeper into the biggest stories of the week," she said.

Malone's presence signals the show's tone. Rather than straight reporting, the format pairs Ferguson's sourcing with an opinionated co-host, betting that listeners want the week's royal news argued over as well as explained.

The Express is betting on its own track record

The same team behind the new show produces Daily Expresso, the Express's existing podcast, which claimed the number-one spot among UK news podcasts on YouTube in June, the publisher said. James Walker, the Daily Express's associate editor for video, said the royal show was a deliberate attempt to repeat that formula on a beat with an already devoted audience. "Our YouTube subscribers are obsessed with the Royal Family, and with no shortage of stories to cover, we're planning to challenge established shows very quickly," Walker said.

The new arrival has plenty of company. Podcast directories list HELLO! magazine's A Right Royal Podcast, which has published more than a hundred episodes, alongside the Daily Mirror's long-running Pod Save The King, an award-winning show that recently rebranded under its new name. The competition suggests royal podcasting is one of the few niches where legacy publishers, not independent creators, still set the pace.

For the Express, video is as much a distribution strategy as a format. Short clips from royal podcasts circulate widely on social feeds, where a single sharp quote can reach far more people than the full episode. A weekly show on YouTube gives the publisher a steady supply of quotable moments from its own hosts. It also arrives as the wider podcast business keeps shifting: industry data went free to the whole sector through the Audiohook-Podscan deal, while podcast ad loads fell for a second straight quarter.

The scale behind the launch is considerable. Reach describes itself as the UK and Ireland's largest commercial news publisher, running more than 120 brands including the Mirror, Express, Daily Record and Daily Star. The company says it reaches two-thirds of the UK online population every month and counts more than 115 million social followers worldwide.

Episodes of the Royals Unscripted podcast go live every Thursday at 7am, and royal watchers now have one more appointment in their weekly feed.

Whether Royals Unscripted finds its audience comes down to the one thing every new show needs: stories people actually want to talk about. Royal news is rarely quiet for long, so the hosts are unlikely to run out of material.