Shameless Media steps away from Australian Podcast Ranker
The company says its video-first podcast strategy mean the Ranker is no longer fit for purpose.
Shameless Media has confirmed it will no longer appear on the Australian Podcast Ranker, citing changes in how its podcasts are now distributed and measured.
In an Instagram post shared this today, the publisher said its expanding focus on full-length video podcasts means key audience data is no longer captured by the Ranker’s methodology.
The Australian Podcast Ranker, published monthly, measures podcast performance using audio downloads only. It does not include video streams, including those on Spotify.
“Without getting too technical,” the company explained, “there are ‘downloads’ (audio) and streams (video). The Ranker only measures downloads.”
Shameless Media said this means Spotify video episode streams, which it expects to be significant as its shows expand into video, will be excluded from official rankings.
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From this week, all Thursday episodes of Shameless Podcast will be available as full-length video on Spotify, marking a further shift in the publisher’s format strategy.
While the Ranker has historically been important to the business, Shameless Media said it has “left the race” in 2026 due to the mismatch between rankings and actual audience behaviour.
The company added it plans to share performance updates more regularly through its own channels and invited audiences to suggest which metrics they would like to see reported.
More broadly, the move spotlights questions around the ongoing relevance of Triton’s podcast rankings as more publishers push into video-first distribution that sits outside download-based measurement.
