![35-year-old American moved to Chengdu and lives on $30,000 a year: ‘[It’s] poverty in America, but in China I’m living large’](https://image.cnbcfm.com/api/v1/image/108167583-1751548516689-chinacelia1.jpg?v=1751549197&w=1920&h=1080 "35-year-old American moved to Chengdu and lives on $30,000 a year: ‘[It’s] poverty in America, but in China I’m living large’")
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Spotify said Monday it paid more than $100 million to podcast publishers and podcasters worldwide in the first quarter of 2025.
The figure includes creators on the platform across all formats and agreements, including the platform’s biggest fish, Joe Rogan, Alex Cooper and Theo Von, the company said.
Rogan, host of “The Joe Rogan Experience,” Cooper of “Call Her Daddy” and “This Past Weekend w/ Theo Von” were among the top podcasts on Spotify globally in 2024.
Rogan and Cooper’s exclusivity deals with Spotify have ended, and while Rogan signed a new Spotify deal last year worth up to $250 million, including revenue sharing and the ability to post on YouTube, Cooper inked a SiriusXM deal in August.
Even when shows are no longer exclusive to Spotify, they are still uploaded to the platform and qualify for the Spotify Partner Program, which launched in January in the U.S., U.K., Canada and Australia.
The program allows creators to earn revenue every time an ad monetized by Spotify plays in the episode, as well as revenue from when Premium subscribers watch dynamic ads on videos.
Competing platform Patreon said it paid out upward of $472 million to podcasters from more than 6.7 million paid memberships in 2024.
YouTube’s payouts are massive by comparison but include more than just podcasts. The company said it paid $70 billion to creators between 2021 and 2024 with payouts rising each year, according to YouTube CEO Neal Mohan.
Spotify reports first-quarter earnings on Tuesday.
