Anchor began its life in a way not dissimilar to Clubhouse: an audio sharing tool frequented by Silicon Valley investors and growth hackers. In 2018 it pivoted to providing free podcast hosting, and has remained a popular choice for beginners and those wanting to save money.

Anchor has a well-considered mobile app that makes content production easy, however it’s geared more towards a style of podcasting that doesn’t really offer value or sustainability: a sort of call-in talk show with added music, thanks to Spotify. This offering adds confusion into the market, as it leads people to think that commercial music can be used in podcasts, and that the “podcasts” produced through the Anchor app can be heard on any app (which they can’t).

Anchor is simply a low-friction way to upload content that can be serialised via RSS. Onboarding is simple, and every podcast gets a cute single webpage. In that way, it’s a solid choice for those who use a podcast as a highlights package of a live Zoom call, Crowdcast show, or who are repurposing audio from a YouTube channel, since its lack of features or useful analytics essentially make it a hard-drive with an RSS attachment.

Spotify bought the product in early 2019, and it’s now IAB compliant, so although the metrics are fairly high-level, the numbers themselves should be accurate. It’s important to them since Anchor relies on DAI to make money.

Podcast.co is a hosting service based in Manchester, UK. Founded in 2017, the company has grown to offer hosting, production, studio rental, advertising, education and more. It also runs the MatchMaker.fm service.

The service is aimed at “businesses and content creators” rather than hobbyists or dyed-in-the-wool podcasters, so it handles podcast distribution itself, abstracting the user from the RSS feed. However this doesn’t affect your ability to migrate away from the platform if you want to go elsewhere.

Although you don’t hear a lot from them in the usual podcasting circles, Podcast.co is spoken highly of and reviewed well amongst those who use it.