How to upload a podcast to YouTube, audio-only too: steps, RSS and YouTube Music

You can, it's free and it isn't the same as uploading a video

It's the first thing people ask Google: yes, you can upload a podcast to YouTube and it costs nothing. What many people don't know is that uploading episodes as standalone videos isn't enough for YouTube to treat them as a podcast.

On YouTube, a show is a playlist with podcast features turned on, and each episode is a video in that playlist. Once it's marked that way, the show carries the podcast badge, can appear in YouTube's podcasts section, gets recommended to people with similar interests and can be played on YouTube Music. And on YouTube Music, according to YouTube's own help pages, most podcasts can be downloaded and played in the background without paying for a subscription.

So if your podcast is already on Spotify or Apple, YouTube isn't just another channel: it's where your show gets watched. This closes the series we started with how to upload a podcast to Spotify and how to upload it to Apple Podcasts. On those two platforms the show almost always arrives through the RSS feed; on YouTube the usual route is to upload the video and set up the podcast by hand.

How to upload a podcast in YouTube Studio, step by step

There are two routes, and both are in YouTube Studio.

If you're starting from scratch, click Create and then New podcast. YouTube may ask you to verify your account first. Enter the title and description, choose whether it's public or private and upload the square cover; YouTube recommends 1,280 by 1,280 pixels. Then, under Content and Podcasts, you open the show and add episodes: new videos or videos already on your channel.

If your episodes are already in a playlist, you don't need to upload them again. Go to Content, Playlists, hover over the playlist, open Options and choose Add podcast features. Check the details, add the square cover and you're done.

YouTube gives some rules worth following to the letter. One podcast per show, with every season together. Inside it, only full episodes, in the order they should be watched: no clips and no videos from other shows. As the title, the name of the show, without adding the word podcast. And each video's title should be the episode's.

On your phone you can upload an episode with the YouTube app and add it to the playlist, but YouTube's help explains everything else in YouTube Studio, and a computer is where it's comfortable to set up.

How to upload an audio-only podcast to YouTube

Google suggests "podcast on YouTube without video" a lot. The answer is the RSS feed, the same link Spotify and Apple use. In YouTube Studio, under Content and Podcasts, you open the show's details and, in the RSS settings, click Connect to an RSS feed. YouTube sends a code to the feed's email address to check it's yours and lets you choose the visibility the episodes go out with. From then on, every new episode on your host is uploaded automatically.

There's small print. It works in a list of countries that includes Spain, Paraguay, Mexico, Argentina and the United States. The first batch goes up as private, so you can check it before opening it. If you change the title or cover on your host, you have to change it by hand on YouTube. And YouTube Music plays only show up in YouTube Studio, not on your host.

But what matters is how it looks: YouTube turns each episode into a video with the cover sitting still from start to finish. That's enough to be there, but on a visual platform it competes badly with shows where you see faces, gestures and reactions. If you plan to take YouTube seriously, what moves the needle is recording on video.

From Spotify to YouTube, YouTube Music and making money

Three questions always come up when people search this topic.

How do I move my podcast from Spotify to YouTube? There's no button that sends it from one platform to the other. If you record on video, you upload the same file to YouTube and add it to the podcast. If it's audio only and your host gives you an RSS feed, you connect it as described above.

How do I get it on YouTube Music? You don't need to do anything extra. As soon as the playlist has podcast features turned on, the show also appears on YouTube Music. If you uploaded it as standalone videos, it doesn't.

Can you make money with a podcast on YouTube? Yes, just like with any channel: through the YouTube Partner Programme, which requires 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 public watch hours in the last twelve months, or 10 million Shorts views in ninety days. On top of that there are sponsorships and brand mentions, which are worth more in a video podcast because the brand is seen. We go into it in depth in how to grow a podcast on YouTube, which is the step after uploading: thumbnails, first seconds, clips and consistency.

Uploading is the easy part: what gets it watched

With the steps above, anyone can have their podcast on YouTube in an afternoon. Getting people to find it and stay is something else, and that's where we come in.

Here's how a channel that works is organised. In our post-production service, for every episode we deliver the full edited episode, with colour, sound and intro; five cuts of around ten minutes for YouTube; seven reels for Instagram, TikTok and Shorts; and the thumbnails and titles. The full episodes go into the podcast; the cuts go into another playlist, exactly as YouTube asks. That way the show stays tidy for YouTube Music and the cuts bring in new viewers without cluttering it.

It's what we do with Aladetres, one of the most watched conversation podcasts in Spain: we handle the edit of every episode and, since we started, the channel has gone from around 100,000 to over 800,000 subscribers on YouTube.

If you have a podcast that still lives only in audio, or one that's already on YouTube and isn't taking off, at Bostak Films we produce it from Barcelona and remotely for the whole of Europe and Latin America. Book a free diagnosis and we'll tell you what we'd change first. Everything we do is on our podcast production page.

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