What is Listen Notes
Listen Notes is a podcast search engine and database founded in San Francisco in 2017 by Wenbin Fang, operating much like Google but for podcasts. It indexes millions of publicly available podcasts and episodes, allowing users to search by topic, person, or place, save episodes to ‘Listen Later’ playlists, create audio clips, and monitor podcast mentions via Listen Alerts. The platform uses 24/7 automated scripts combined with human moderation to maintain a high-quality database of genuine, human-crafted podcasts rather than AI-generated content.
Beyond the consumer-facing website, Listen Notes offers a developer-grade Podcast API (PodcastAPI.com) trusted by over 12,000 companies and developers, enabling them to build podcast apps, clipping tools, social platforms, and market intelligence products. It also provides bulk Podcast Datasets in CSV or SQLite format for researchers, AI training, and enterprise data needs. A Premium Membership unlocks advanced ‘Super Search’ filters, Listen Alerts for brand monitoring, and access to a podcast contacts database.
Reviewers highlight Listen Notes as a powerful tool for podcast discovery, PR and marketing research, journalist sourcing, and developer integrations. Its flexible billing options — including a low-commitment 2-day access pass — make it accessible for occasional professional use without long-term subscription commitments.
Key Features
- Full-text podcast and episode search across millions of shows by people, places, or topics
- 'Listen Later' playlists exportable to any podcast app via RSS
- Listen Alerts for monitoring podcast mentions (like Google Alerts for podcasts)
- Listen Score — a popularity metric ranking podcasts on a 0–100 scale using first- and third-party data
- Podcast API (PodcastAPI.com) with FREE, PRO, and ENTERPRISE tiers for developers
- Podcast Datasets — bulk metadata exports in CSV or SQLite format
- Official Chrome browser extension for searching podcasts directly from the address bar or page context menu
Why we like it
- Searches over 3.7 million podcasts and 190+ million episodes by people, places, or topics — like Google for podcasts
- Trusted by 12,000+ companies and developers via its Podcast API, with client libraries for Node.js, Python, Ruby, PHP, Swift, Go, Java, and more
- Flexible low-commitment pricing including a 2-day Premium pass for $26, ideal for one-off PR or research projects
Pros & Cons
Pros
- Massive, high-quality podcast database maintained with human moderation to exclude AI-generated junk
- Easy-to-use interface praised for great UI and strong product-market fit
- Helps surface niche and independent podcasts that are harder to find on major platforms
- Flexible billing options (daily, monthly, annual) make it accessible for occasional professional use
Cons
- No dedicated mobile app — search engine is browser-only (Chrome extension available as a workaround)
- Transcripts available for less than 1% of episodes via the API; full transcript access requires a separate paid service (Listen411)
- Non-Enterprise API users must display a 'Powered by Listen Notes' badge and cannot cache API response data server-side
Who is using Listen Notes
Ideal for podcast listeners seeking deep discovery, PR and marketing professionals researching podcast outreach, journalists sourcing audio content, and developers building podcast-powered applications.
- Podcast listeners discovering new shows and building personal episode playlists
- Journalists and researchers finding podcast episodes covering specific people or topics
- PR and marketing professionals building podcast contact lists and monitoring brand mentions
- Developers building podcast apps, clipping tools, or market intelligence platforms using the Podcast API
- Podcasters finding cross-promotion opportunities, sponsors, guests, and co-hosts via classified ads
Listen Notes Pricing
Freemium
Free tier available for website use and API (with quota limits). Premium Membership available with daily billing (e.g. 2-day access for US $26), monthly, or annual plans. Podcast API has FREE, PRO, and ENTERPRISE tiers; APIs and datasets range from $1.60/1,000 requests to $200/month. Enterprise plan requires annual contract with 35,000+ requests/month minimum.
Pricing details may change. Check the official website for the latest information.
What makes Listen Notes unique
Unlike podcast directories such as Apple Podcasts or Spotify, Listen Notes functions as a true search engine across the entire public podcast ecosystem — searching show notes and audio transcripts by people, places, or topics rather than just titles. It uniquely combines a consumer discovery website, a developer-grade REST API (PodcastAPI.com) trusted by 12,000+ companies, and bulk dataset exports, making it one of the few podcast tools that serves casual listeners, PR professionals, and enterprise developers from a single platform. Competitors like Podchaser focus on community reviews, Taddy API offers GraphQL and built-in transcripts, and Goodpods emphasises social discovery — none combine the same breadth of search depth, API maturity, and data export options.
Listen Notes Alternatives
Podchaser, Taddy, Goodpods, Rephonic, Podkite
Reviews & Ratings
★★★★★ 0.0 • (0)Share Your Experience
No Reviews Yet
Be the first to share your experience with this tool