Apple Celebrates 20th Anniversary of Taking Podcasts Mainstream With iPod and iTunes

To celebrate the 20th anniversary of iTunes gaining support for podcasts, Apple has shared a new web page highlighting 20 podcasts that the company loves.

Apple Podcasts 20
The podcasts are categorized by year: 2005-2010, 2011-2015, 2016-2020, and 2021-2025.

Featured podcasts include This American Life, Acquired, The Daily, and others.

Apple shared a letter to honor the occasion:

At Apple Podcasts, we love podcasts.

Since the medium came to iTunes in 2005, our team has dedicated countless hours to helping people discover new shows. To celebrate 20 years, here are 20 favorites that best exemplify how far podcasting has come—and where it can go in the next two decades.

This list is a love letter to the podcasts that left a lasting impact on us and the ones we continue to recommend again and again. They are shows with hosts that feel like friends, and shows that make us press play immediately on the latest episode to hear what happens next. These shows have measurably improved our lives and helped define this medium we know and love.

Explore the list and join the celebration.

The anniversary is technically in a few more days, as Apple released iTunes 4.9 with support for discovering, listening to, and subscribing to podcasts on June 28, 2005.

"Apple is taking Podcasting mainstream by building it right into iTunes," said Steve Jobs, in a press release shared that day. "Podcasting is the next generation of radio, and users can now subscribe to over 3,000 free Podcasts and have each new episode automatically delivered over the Internet to their computer and iPod."

You can still read our own Arnold Kim's coverage of the iTunes update that day. Time flies!

Podcasts emerged a few years before iTunes support came along. The word "podcast" is credited to journalist Ben Hammersley, who referred to "podcasting" in a 2004 article in The Guardian. The word is a portmanteau of "iPod" and "broadcast."

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Top Rated Comments

ryanasimov Avatar
15 weeks ago
That is a truly creative graphic!
Score: 39 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Unregistered 4U Avatar
15 weeks ago
Gotta say, that’s a clever image :)
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)
xDKP Avatar
15 weeks ago

That is a truly creative graphic!
Amazing really. Look too focussed and the “20” almost disappears
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)
ipedro Avatar
15 weeks ago
I cut the cord to cable back in 2007 with the first tv before there was streaming content. I'd buy entire seasons of TV shows and movies but I survived mostly on a diet of Podcasts. I'd listen to the Podfather Adam Curry and video podcasts from Diggnation and others. Anyone remember Revision3?


Honestly, I kind of miss those days of innocence when podcasts were truly self productions and conversation style shows. Now many of them have gone corporate and high level production and it doesn't feel as authentic.

Attachment Image
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)
sjsharksfan12 Avatar
15 weeks ago
Podcasting changed my media consumption in a big way. I was always a radio person, but my annoyances with radio hosts not talking about Hockey (or disparaging the sport saying no one cares) made me look elsewhere. Then I found podcasts and have been listening to more podcasts than radio. The thing I don't like is this feeling like they want to go to Video and Youtube and you have to watch the shows rather than listening to the shows while you do other things. It's hard to watch video and work out, for example. It hasn't felt like 20 years.

I still listen to SiriusXM on occasion but the only time I go back to Terrestrial radio is to listen to Giants games. Can't stand what the local Sports stations have become.

Itunes was so revolutionary for it's time. I still remember when they were joking at a WWDC that it became basically the go to to everything and there is truth to that. Still, I miss the days of the old Itunes, the Single of the week, getting Podcasts synced to my Ipod, stuff like that. It was quite a world.
Score: 4 Votes (Like | Disagree)
al256 Avatar
15 weeks ago
It's my understanding that Adam Curry, the Podfather, transferred the RSS index of Podcasts to Apple at that time to maintain it going forward.
Score: 4 Votes (Like | Disagree)