According to a recent global survey by  YouGov quoted in Variety, Indonesia, UAE, India and China are top four countries where listeners are interested in paying for podcasts over the next 12 months.

The survey was conducted between January 18 and February 4, 2022, among 18,855 adults aged 18+ across 18 countries including Great Britain, US, Mexico, Australia, China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Indonesia, India and UAE. All samples were composed of consumers who said they listened to podcasts, and they were asked how likely, if at all, would they be to pay or donate money to access/listen to a podcast in the next 12 months?

68 percent Indonesians, 65 percent from UAE, 59 percent from India and 55 percent from China said they were Very or somewhat likely.

When asked how often they listened to podcasts, UAE, Mexico and India, were the top three countries where respondents listened to podcasts once or a few times a day.

This could encourage podcast companies to pursue a model where they could generate subscription revenue through international channels. It would, however, also be affected by varying degrees of internet freedom and censorship across territories.

With an expanding listener base, tech platforms have also shown interest in courting more podcast listeners across regions. Apple Podcasts has launched subscriptions last year in over 170 countries, and YouTube is reportedly offering grants of up to $300,000 to podcast networks to help podcast producers create filmed versions of their programs and Twitter may soon have a tab to allow listeners to listen to podcasts.