Spotify Podcast Partner Program Expands to 35 Markets

Spotify is taking its podcast monetization system global this fall. The company announced on September 17 that the Spotify Podcast Partner Program, which pays eligible podcasters a share of ad and Premium revenue, will open in more than 35 new markets, including Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, Italy, Spain, Poland, Chile, the Dominican Republic and the Bahamas, according to TechCrunch.

It is the largest geographic expansion of the program since Spotify began testing podcast monetization in the United States, Europe and Australia. The full list spans Latin America, the Caribbean and parts of Europe, bringing the program to countries such as Peru, Guatemala, Jamaica, Haiti, Trinidad and Tobago and Curaçao, among others, as reported by the creator trade press.

For creators in those markets, the practical change is simple: podcasters who qualify can now earn money directly from their shows on Spotify instead of relying solely on outside sponsorships. Eligible shows can collect revenue from video impressions watched by Spotify Premium subscribers, a share of ad revenue generated by free-tier listeners, and ads served when episodes play on other podcast platforms. Creators keep 100 percent of the revenue from their own sponsorship deals and remain free to distribute their shows everywhere else.

What changes for creators

Spotify has also made it easier to qualify. Earlier this year the company lowered the bar for video podcasts: creators can now join the Spotify Podcast Partner Program with a minimum of three published episodes, 2,000 consumption hours and 1,000 engaged audience members over the previous 30 days. Spotify said that change alone lifted consumption across participating shows by an average of 45 percent.

The rollout will happen gradually through the fall. In the newly added markets, the expansion will also change what listeners hear: Premium subscribers watching video podcasts will see fewer interruptions, because dynamic ads are removed from participating shows while each creator's own baked-in sponsorships stay in place, according to PodcastingToday.

Spotify is working with third-party hosting platforms so creators do not have to move their shows to join. The company is partnering with Acast, Audioboom, Libsyn, Omny and Podigee to let their podcasters participate without switching distributors, reported Sounds Profitable. That matters because many independent shows already run their RSS feeds through one of those hosts.

The bet on video

The numbers behind the move come from Spotify itself. The company said video podcast consumption on its platform has climbed 140 percent since the feature launched in 2022, and that total monthly payouts to shows enrolled in the Partner Program have grown by more than a third since January.

The shift reflects where podcasting is heading. Video versions of podcasts have become the area with the strongest momentum, with creators filming interviews and roundtables for viewers who increasingly treat podcasts like talk shows. Other big names are making the same bet: NPR is launching Machine Gods, a video-first show from Kevin Roose and Casey Newton, on its podcast feeds and YouTube this October. YouTube has dominated video podcasting, paying creators through its own Partner Program and drawing big audiences for video episodes. Spotify's expansion is a direct bid to give podcasters a second platform that pays for video views.

That competition has been heating up on both sides. Earlier this year Spotify loosened its video eligibility rules specifically to pull more creators into its monetization system, and it has been rolling out sponsorship tools for video hosts across Spotify for Creators and Megaphone. Meanwhile YouTube remains the largest destination for podcast video consumption, a position Spotify is openly trying to challenge.

Why these markets

The choice of markets points to where podcast audiences are growing fastest. Latin America and parts of Europe and the Caribbean have seen steady growth in podcast listening, but creators there have had fewer built-in ways to earn from their work than their counterparts in the United States. Opening the Partner Program in those regions gives local shows a path to revenue that did not exist before, and gives Spotify a foothold with the next wave of video-first creators.

For a generation of creators filming in home studios across Mexico City, São Paulo and Madrid, the message is that their videos are worth paying for. Whether the payouts will be meaningful depends on how many viewers turn into engaged audience members, a bar Spotify deliberately set low enough for emerging shows to clear.

The first wave of newly eligible creators should see the program open in their markets later this fall, with the remaining regions following through the season.