Buzzsprout is one of the platforms for hosting, promoting, and tracking podcasts.
With the recent surge in the popularity of podcasts and the number of people listening to podcasts all over the world likely to go up, new podcasters keep running to Buzzsprout because it’s straightforward and easy to use.
Buzzsprout has also been a favorite to advanced podcasters who enjoy its advanced analytics, promotion, and monetization features.
Podcasting is one of the most significant avenues for attracting an audience today. While Buzzsprout claims to offer all you need to have a successful podcast, it lacks in a few areas. For example, a plan offering unlimited audio is missing.
Besides, it has limited customization options. The platform even deletes the episodes you host after 90 days. All these things push users to look for better alternatives sometimes.
Luckily, alternatives to Buzzsprout are abundant. Take a look at the list below to explore some of the best.
These tools have their pros and cons, but you can be sure to make an excellent podcast with any of these alternatives. So let’s get straight to it!
Best Buzzsprout Alternatives
1. Simplecast
Simplecast is a modern and independent podcast hosting and analytics platform that lets you publish your podcast to the world with a click. Simplecast allows you to publish your podcast to Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you feel your audience is.
This platform was launched in 2013 and has since gained tremendous popularity and branding. Like Buzzsprout, Simplecast has a user-friendly interface that offers an easy-to-handle experience, making it an excellent choice for people of all ages.
Simplecast supports shows of all shapes and sizes and has a robust audio streaming infrastructure that delivers millions of audio content daily.
The platform also features a first-of-its-kind analytics tool that enables you to understand your audience, compare podcast trends, and get insight into what part of your show is shared the most.
The Simplecast show Migrator ensures you move your podcast to a new home with zero heavy lifting. Simplecast has a world-class support team available all week to attend to your questions before you move.
The platform understands how much podcasters never want to maintain third-party websites for their podcasts, so they make it simple for you to build your site on Simplecast.
With their new site builder, you can create a site just as you would publish your first podcast, customize your theme colors, and create additional pages.
Unlike Buzzsprout, the support options on Simplecast are diverse, with a rich knowledge base and FAQs/forums.
The only downside of Simplecast is that it lacks built-in revenue generation features. Overall, Simplecast is reliable, trustworthy, and best if you want to entertain a large audience.
Simplecast plans are customized to meet podcasting needs. The platform offers three plans for independent podcasters; a Basic plan for $15 per month with everything you need to launch a podcast and an Essential plan for $35 per month with additional tools for growing your podcast
It also offers a Growth plan for $85 per month with additional collaboration tools and deeper insights.
2. Podbean
Podbean is one of the best alternatives to Buzzsprout that allows you to create, promote, and monetize your podcast quickly and powerfully.
The all-in-one podcast publishing platform, is home to more than 600,000 podcasters making compelling podcasts right from their phones using the podcast recording app or the quality and professional Podbean streaming.
With Podbean, you can easily publish your audio or video, grow your audience through connected social media, or distribute your podcast to popular listening apps such as Spotify, and Apple Podcast.
Podbean has monetizing tools such as Ads Marketplace that help you make money from your podcast. The monetization tools allow you to maximize revenue by selling premium content, connecting to ads, and getting listener support.
This platform offers a user-friendly environment. Hence, it is suitable for users of all ages. Podbean stays ahead of Buzzsprout regarding customization, thanks to its advanced customization options that allow you to focus more on personal branding.
You get a free podcast website for every podcast account you create with Podbean. Podbean features well-designed and mobile-responsive templates and robust features to help you customize your website to show off your podcast.
You’ll also love the IAB-certified podcast analytics by Podbean and intuitive charts to help grow your podcast.
Podbean’s live streaming option can help you expand your podcast and excitingly engage your listeners. While live streaming, you can take calls and get real-time comments or earn virtual currency through ticket sales and gifts.
Podbean has affordable pricing plans for podcasters. You can start with the free Basic plan or advance to the Unlimited Audio plan for $9 per month for unlimited audio podcasting.
The Unlimited Plus plan for $29 per month gives you the best value and is ideal for creating video podcasts and monetization.
3. Captivate
Captivate is another excellent option for a podcast hosting platform that incorporates other work processes to make publishing podcasts easier.
It offers flexibility and freedom to create and distribute unlimited podcasts, get advanced podcast analytics, and promote and monetize your podcast in a single dashboard.
It also features an inbuilt marketing suite with all you need to share your podcast with the world, including sponsor kits, websites, and private feeds.
This tool provides easy-to-understand stats to help you grasp how your podcast is doing. It lets you see the total number of downloads, listener demographics, unique listeners, and web traffic.
Captivate achieved IAB certification a few months after its launch, so you can be sure to get industry standard and reliable analytics.
The platform gives you websites that are more than RSS feeds. You can choose one of its three responsive templates, add team bios, lead magnets, and email sign-up forms.
Captivate stands out against Buzzsprout because it does not alter your audio files when you upload them. It also allows you to get creative and control your production; with Captivate, you can upload more episodes than with Buzzsprout.
It also does better regarding knowledge to help you grow your podcast and generate more revenue from your show.
Captivate Growth Labs is a place to learn how to market podcasts and get more listeners and sponsors, and it offers you a safe community for accountability and sharing feedback.
Captivate’s pricing plans come with a seven-day free trial and access to Captivate Growth Labs.
Its Personal plan goes for $17 per month, the Professional plan for $44 per month, and the Business plan for $90 per month. All these plans are paid yearly and allow you to create unlimited podcasts.
4. Transistor
Transistor is another podcast hosting platform that is a comparatively new contender to the list. You can record your audio and upload it to Transistor, which helps you distribute your podcast to Spotify, Google Podcast, and Apple Podcasts.
The platform has gained immense popularity since it was launched in 2018. Global podcasters run to Transistor for its many features ideal for professional podcasting, and the platform will not charge you for creating additional podcasts.
With Transistor, you maintain ownership of your entire original content, including texts, audio, or images, which you create and upload to the platform. One thing that will excite you about Transistor is that it won’t add ads or sponsorships to your podcast without your permission.
You are also free to monetize, run your ads, and distribute your podcast any way you see fit. Transistor detailed analytics report includes your average downloads per episode, number of subscribers, popular podcast apps, and trends.
Transistor may not be an old player in the podcasting industry. Still, it dominates Buzzsprout by allowing you to upload more episodes, and the platform auto-posts your episodes to YouTube.
It is used by organizations such as IBM, the NHL’s Golden Knights, and the US
Department of Veterans Affairs. Transistor has a built-in template for your website, so all you need is to choose a design, and Transistor will automatically generate a website for your show.
Transistor is reliable, easy to use, and has the best customer service even on their 14-day free trial plan. Transistor offers three plans: Starter plan for $19 per month, Professional for $49, and Business plan for $99 per month.
The platform also has an Enterprise plan for podcasters who need more than 250,000 downloads per month and over 3,000 private subscribers.
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5. Spreaker
Spreaker is one of the most used podcast hosting platforms that allows you to create, publish, and make money with your podcasts. IHeartMedia runs Spreaker, one of the US’s largest media companies.
This platform attracts podcasters from various age groups as it is easy and efficient. Spreaker has all you need to turn your passion into a profession. Whether you are working on a passion project or wish to grow your podcast business, Spreaker will come through for you.
Spreaker will capture your attention the minute you show up on its website. Its interface is bright, modern, and inviting. It has more monetization tools available than Buzzsprout.
The only limitation you’ll encounter with Spreaker is when you exceed their audio storage capacity. Its storage limit runs from 100-1500 audio hours, and the episode duration is 45 minutes to three hours.
Overall, Spreaker is a great podcast hosting platform, giving new podcasters plenty of room to exercise their craft before hitting the storage limit. When they do, they can easily upgrade to a larger limit.
You can start your Spreaker experience by signing up for their free plan, which allows you to upload up to 10 episodes and gives you six months of statistics on how your podcast is fairing.
If you wish to make money with your podcast, upgrade to the On-Air Talent plan for $8 per month or enjoy 500 hours of storage and save up to 90% with their Broadcaster plan for $2 per month.
Other plans include Anchorman, which gives you 1,500 hours of storage and is also discounted at 90%, and the Publisher plan, which provides unlimited audio storage for $120 per month.
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6. Libsyn
For about 15 years, Libsyn has been an excellent choice for some of the best podcast creators worldwide. Whether you want to start a podcast out of passion or seek superstardom, Libsyn is rich in publishing and monetization features to meet your unique needs.
While Buzzsprout places its plans on a 250 MB bandwidth limit per month, Libsyn stays ahead by offering unlimited bandwidth and reach. It is an excellent platform for beginners and experts, and its unparalleled customer support ensures you are heard and seen.
Libsyn podcast distribution allows you to publish your work to popular directories such as Google, Apple, and Spotify. The platform will host audio and video podcasts with free custom-branded audio and video players.
It lets you promote your podcast through simple social marketing magic, where you schedule custom marketing to be published on different times and dates, accompanied by unique copies and images.
With Libsyn, you can individualize almost everything! Be it media players, your podcast website, or show and episode artwork, Libsyn ensures that your podcast looks its best.
This platform provides advanced analytics, including charts, interactive maps, and insights on favorite apps for your fan base, players, and destinations.
Its IAB Tech Lab verified stats help you understand your audience and rethink your podcast promotion strategies. You can access the information you need to manage and update your podcast from anywhere through your mobile phone.
Libsyn offers audio and video podcast hosting plans for everyone. Each plan comes with free podcast imports, and you can cancel the plan anytime.
The three-hour plan for $5 comes with 162 MB storage per month, the six-hour plan for $15 offers 324 MB monthly storage, while the 10-hour plan for $20 offers 540 MB monthly storage.
7. Casted
Casted is a robust alternative to Buzzsprout, offering a wholesome podcasting approach. Casted takes you through the entire recording, mixing, hosting, and publishing process.
While Buzzsprout targets individuals more, Casted is more of a B2B podcast and video platform that allows you to understand your audience and what drives them, and deliver content that fosters authentic engagement and delivers value.
This platform came into the market in 2019 and significantly impacted the salesforce within a short time. Its global team continues to deliver audio content in unique and reliable ways.
It has excellent customer support. While it is relatively new in the market, its team is constantly working to improve user experience and platform performance across multiple devices.
Casted puts on extensive analytics understandable to an average user, and these stats add more flavor to your podcast, aside from showing the surface-level numbers.
The only drawback is that you might encounter a few technical hiccups while using it; however, the team consistently works to offer the best experience. Overall, Casted is a great podcast hosting and marketing resource that can help you increase with listeners.
It offers three pricing packages: Starter, Pro, and Enterprise. Talk to their sales team for pricing details.
8. SoundCloud
Another exciting alternative to Buzzsprout is SoundCloud. It lets you host a podcast, reach your target audience, interact with listeners, and make new fans.
While many users would argue that Buzzsprout meets their business needs way better than SoundCloud, the latter offers better usage coverage in more website categories, including science and education, arts and entertainment, and computer electronics and technology.
It’s easy to get started with SoundCloud. Create an account for your podcast, complete your profile information, adjust your content settings, submit your podcast feed to other distributor platforms such as iTunes, Stitcher, and TuneIn, and you are good to go.
The only inconveniences you are likely to encounter with SoundCloud are time-to-time lags, the site taking too long to load, and the random selection of songs, which play once the song of your choice is over.
SoundCloud allows you to share your sound with the world with three plans. The free plan allows you to upload up to three hours of your podcast, access basic insights, and have HD storage.
But to grow your audience and unlock unlimited upload time, upgrade to the Pro Unlimited plan for $12 per month or subscribe to Repost by SoundCloud for $2.50 per month.
Repost by SoundCloud helps you distribute your sound to major music services, access more promotional tools, and split payments with your collaborators.
Explore the best alternatives to SoundCloud here.
9. Podomatic
Podomatic is one of the podcast hosting platforms that allows you to record, publish, distribute, and monetize your podcast the easy way.
Like Buzzsprout, Podomatic helps you get your podcast in front of millions of listeners, and you can get started with the platform in four simple steps.
Create a free podcast account, record, publish, share your trailer, submit your podcast to Spotify, Apple Podcast, or Google Podcasts, and keep publishing new podcasts to grow.
While Buzzsprout’s API is created for third parties looking to integrate their applications with their podcast hosting service, Podomatic lacks an integrated plugin.
However, Podomatic allows you to copy and paste your RSS feed to your website and embed it with a podcast player. Overall, Podomatic has every tool you need to share your creation with the world.
Your listeners can play all episodes you share on Facebook, Twitter, or any other social media platform.
Podomatic helps you launch your independent podcast with their free basic plan with 15GB bandwidth per month and 500 MB storage.
You can upgrade to their annual plans and get two months off to extend your reach and take your voice to professional levels. Subscribe to Podomatic Pro for $2.49 per month or Pro Plus for $8.32 per month.
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10. Blubrry
Blubrry makes podcast hosting easier as it’s a smooth podcast publishing platform with live customer support, impactful statistics, and stress-free migration. Blubrry allows you to launch a single episode or an entire network.
The platform lets you connect with listeners, monetize your podcast, and watch yourself grow. The platform has existed since 2005, offering podcasters advanced podcast insights for better audience understanding.
What places Blubrry ahead of Buzzsprout is its support for private podcasting. While Buzzsprout does not offer private feeds even with the highest paid plans, Blubrry offers private hosting that delivers secure video and audio to any device.
Blubrry’s pro production team ensures that your podcast is edited and published to sound like a fine-tuned machine.
It offers two plans billed annually. No contracts are needed, and you can cancel the plan anytime.
Subscribe to Blubrry’s Standard plan for $10 per month to enjoy 125 MB monthly storage and unlimited downloads. You can also upgrade to the Advanced plan for $17 per month to enjoy 400 MB monthly storage, advanced statistics, and unlimited downloads.
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11. Fireside
Fireside is one of the most potent podcast hosting and analytics tools with all the features you need to take your podcast to a new level. Podcasters created Fireside for podcasters, and since 2006, the platform has distributed podcasts everywhere.
It makes it easy to publish your content to Spotify, Google Podcasts, TuneIn, iHeartRadio, Stitcher, and Apple Podcasts.
Every podcast gets a beautiful, highly responsive, and customizable website. The inbuilt website lets you create episode pages, custom pages, guest pages, and more.
It also offers seamless transfer by importing your existing podcast from any host or RSS feed if you already have a podcast.
Buzzsprout and Fireside functionality are pretty similar, but Fireside seems proactive in its updates, and recently the platform implemented a one-click submission to Amazon Music and Podcast Index.
Fireside has three plans: a Starter plan for $9 per month for one podcast, a Standard plan for $19 per month for unlimited episodes and unlimited storage, and a Professional plan for $49 per month.
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Final Words
Now that you understand more about the various podcast hosting and monetizing platforms discussed above, you can choose one that suits your needs.
All platforms are great, but if you need a quick suggestion, I recommend you go for Podbean.
With Podbean, you’ll enjoy unlimited bandwidth and storage, an easy-to-use interface, and a mobile app. There is no learning curve involved, and it has plenty of features for beginners and pro podcasters.
