Streaming platforms seek to reclaim prime time: are video podcasts the new talk show?

Traditional television faces unexpected competition. While viewers abandon conventional daytime talk shows, streaming platforms are discovering video podcasts as an opportunity to capture that captive audience seeking constant companionship content.

Netflix Changes Its Content Strategy

Netflix’s stock reveals a clear bet on the video podcast format. The platform has recently closed deals with iHeartMedia and Barstool Sports to secure exclusive video rights, while engaging in advanced discussions with SiriusXM. This move is a direct response to YouTube’s dominance in conversational content consumption.

The numbers speak for themselves: YouTube recorded over 700 million hours of podcast viewing on (television screens, etc.) during 2025, nearly double the 400 million from the previous year. This consumption explosion is no coincidence; it reflects a profound shift in how people consume entertainment while performing other activities.

The Long-Term Threat to Netflix

For Matthew Dysart, an entertainment lawyer and former head of podcast business affairs at Spotify, the trend is clear: “As people start spending less time watching traditional TV and more time with short-form, low-cost content on YouTube, that poses a long-term competitive threat to Netflix.”

Netflix isn’t alone in this race. Spotify has already invested billions acquiring startups and podcast studios, trying to control the entire ecosystem from recording software to monetization tools. However, Netflix takes a more selective approach, focusing on partnerships with established media companies rather than paying astronomical sums to individual creators.

The Reality of Independent Podcasters

Not everyone celebrates this strategy. Independent creators maintain a cautious perspective, recalling what happened when Spotify excessively consolidated the industry, created an investment bubble, and ultimately caused it to collapse, leaving studios and creators resource-less.

Mike Schubert and Sequoia Simone, podcasters who launched “Professional Talkers” as a video-oriented production, found that their established audience preferred traditional audio format. “We published an episode only in audio and got similar results,” Schubert explained. “Why put so much effort into video if we can achieve the same with audio?”

Ronald Young Jr., another interviewed podcaster, questioned the motivation behind these corporate moves: “Basically, they’re saying: ‘We want to be the king of content, and the only way is attacking YouTube’.” Young Jr. recognizes that some viewers prefer to leave video podcasts playing in the background, similar to how people have used talk shows and conventional programs for decades, but warns of the risks of excessive consolidation.

What Really Defines a Podcast?

There is a conceptual gap between how creators and executives understand podcasts. For many creators, a podcast can be a casual conversation for YouTube, but also scripted fiction with professional sound design, or investigative audio stories in the NPR style.

Independent podcaster Eric Silver summarizes the problem: “The word podcast has become too vague. Now it simply means show.” This ambiguity allows Netflix and other platforms to redefine the format according to their commercial goals.

Dysart anticipates that Netflix will ramp up its investments: “I would expect Netflix to try to close some nine-figure deal with a top-tier podcast creator, and to heavily invest in original podcasts with very high-profile personalities.”

The Future of Companion Entertainment

What Netflix seeks is to displace the role that daytime talk shows have played for decades: being the background entertainment while people go about their daily activities. Mikah Sargent, producer at TWiT.tv, explains it this way: “We often hear from our listeners: ‘You were my company when I was going through a tough time.’”

If Netflix manages to capture that dynamic, it could transform how entertainment is consumed. Just as previous generations had soap operas or shows like “The Office” in the background, the next might have video podcasts as their perpetual daytime talk show, available on demand and seasonless.

The question isn’t whether podcasts will replace traditional television, but whether streaming platforms will succeed in becoming the preferred destination to do so.