Apple Podcasts will provide follower metrics for podcast creators beginning in April, the company said on Tuesday morning.
On Apple Podcasts, listeners are able to follow their favorite shows to receive alerts when new episodes become available. As part of the rollout, all creators with an Apple Podcasts Connect account will be able to see how many followers they have per show and monitor the number of new followers earned over the last week, month, 60 days and all time. Other updated metrics will include the time audiences have spent listening to their respective shows and episodes with a percentage breakdown of listeners who are or are not followers of the show.
The follower metrics, as with other podcast data on the platform, can only be accessed by the show’s creators — and will not be made publicly available.
Last April, when Apple announced it was launching paid subscriptions for its podcasts, the service updated its podcast creator dashboard with new performance metrics like total listeners, total plays, engaged listeners — defined as those who listen to at least 20 minutes or 40 percent of an episode, depending on length — and listeners by city and country. The refreshed dashboard also features graphics like an episode performance chart, which compares listeners across episodes over set time frames.
