YouTube Podcast Analytics in 2026: Views, Watch Time, Retention, Traffic & Revenue

YouTube Studio now gives podcast creators a dedicated analytics view for understanding how a show performs beyond individual episode metrics.

Where to find podcast analytics

Open YouTube Studio, go to Analytics and select the relevant podcast from the Your Podcast(s) card. If your channel has only one podcast, that will be the only option shown.

What the podcast overview shows

YouTube’s podcast analytics can surface:

• Views
• Watch time
• Traffic sources
• Audience demographics
• Audience retention
• Revenue data for eligible channels

Views alone are not enough

A podcast episode can generate many views but weak watch time if viewers leave early. Compare views with average view duration and retention to understand whether people actually stay for the conversation.

Traffic sources

Use traffic-source data to see whether podcast listeners are finding episodes through:

• YouTube Home and Browse
• Suggested videos
• Search
• Podcast surfaces
• Channel pages
• External sources

This helps separate discovery from loyal-listener behavior.

Audience retention

Retention is especially useful for long-form podcast episodes. Look for repeated drop points around:

• Long intros
• Ad reads
• Topic changes
• Guest introductions
• Dead air or weak pacing

Spikes can reveal moments viewers replay or skip toward.

Compare multiple podcast shows

If a channel runs more than one podcast, YouTube lets creators switch between shows. Compare performance by show rather than mixing unrelated podcast formats into one average.

Revenue analysis

Eligible monetized creators can review podcast revenue data alongside the wider channel Revenue reports. Use that data with RPM and watch time rather than judging the business only by raw views.

See our YouTube RPM vs CPM guide for the revenue metrics.

Podcast analytics vs normal video analytics

Podcast episodes are still YouTube videos, so normal video-level analytics remain useful. The podcast view adds show-level context so creators can understand the performance of the podcast as a series.

Weekly podcast review

1. Check total podcast views and watch time.
2. Review top-performing episodes.
3. Compare traffic sources.
4. Inspect retention on long episodes.
5. Check whether new viewers become returning viewers.
6. Review geography and audience demographics where enough data is available.
7. Compare revenue against production cost.

Do not optimize only for shorter episodes

A shorter episode can produce higher percentage retention while generating less total watch time. Evaluate both absolute watch time and percentage viewed before changing episode length.

For show setup and YouTube Music distribution, see our YouTube Podcasts guide.

Official source

See YouTube’s current podcast setup and analytics documentation.