No average Joe
Joe Rogan has been the world’s most popular podcaster for a while now — with The Joe Rogan Experience topping Spotify’s global podcast chart for the 4th time in a row last year — but only recently has data revealed just how big Rogan’s following is. Figures reported by Bloomberg showed that, as of last Thursday, Rogan’s show had a total of 14.5m followers on Spotify — almost triple the amount of the next most followed program, TED Talks Daily.
Hot pod
The figures are especially impressive when you consider that these followers have been accrued over the course of only 4 years, as the show wasn’t even on the platform before its founder signed a $100m exclusive deal in 2020, renewed just last month to the tune of a reported $250m (this time without exclusive rights).
Admittedly, follower numbers aren’t a perfect measure of popularity: Spotify expressed that it “represents the number of users who have decided to ‘follow’ a show on Spotify”, and not “a show’s total audience or the performance of an episode”, as not all followers will listen and not all listeners will follow.
Nevertheless, Rogan’s influence extends far beyond Spotify, with 16.4m YouTube subscribers and 18.9m followers on his personal Instagram... although the demographics of his audience are more concentrated: a recent YouGov survey found that 81% of Joe Rogan listeners were male, and 56% were between 18-34 years-old.
