Hello friends,

At least once a week, someone posts online or sends me an email, asking how much it’s going to cost to make their podcast.

But I’m gonna be perfectly honest with you. Math is not my gift. It’s actually my least favorite part of the job!

So rather than doing this process dozens of times, I thought I’d just run through my system and share it with the world, in the hopes that people will stop asking me – and start doing the math themselves.

If you ask Google, it will tell you that the average cost of starting a podcast is between $100 and $5000.

First of all, let’s just admit that $100 is laughably low. To produce even a single episode of a podcast for $100, you have to assume these things:

• Everyone working on the podcast is a volunteer.
• You’re using crappy mics. Dollar store ear buds. Free software. The lowest paid tier on the cheapest possible publishing platform.
• You’re spending zero dollars on marketing. Zero.

So, yeah, a single episode of a podcast is likely to cost more than $100.

But the upper range of Google’s estimate is also laughable. Starting up a podcast (and producing just one episode) can cost much more than $5000.

So. Much. More.

I’ve worked on podcasts that cost more than $20,000 per episode, and the upper limit is well north of $100,000 per episode.

So let’s get a bit more realistic, shall we?

Start-up Costs (You only pay these once.)

Equipment: You’re probably going to want to spend at least $200-300 on your host’s microphone. You can spend a lot more, but it’s not necessary. Get a decent pair of wired, over the ear headphones. Plan to spend at least $50 on those, though many pros spend $100-250.

Cover art: I’d say $500, minimum. Don’t be one of those people who tries to use fiverr for this. If you want to do it for free, go to Canva.com and design your own!

Show development: This is a super, duper variable cost. The more complex your episode structure, the more time and experimentation you’re gonna need to get it right. I usually work backwards. I figure out the per-episode cost of my project, and then I plan to spend at least that amount on show development. So if each episode is going to cost $3000 to produce, I try to budget at least $3000 for show development.

But let’s face it, this cost can be MUCH higher if your team is new to podcasting and/or trying to do something original.

Total: Variable, but probably not less than $2000.

Monthly costs (I’m giving you the lower end, but many of these have much pricier options.)

• $15-24/month for Riverside
• $12-24/month for Descript (I like to use Riverside to record and Descript to transcribe and rough edit. In my opinion, this is the option that sounds the best and results in the fewest number of human hours.)
• $12-24/month for editing/mixing software (Hindenberg, Adobe Audition or Pro Tools)
• $12/month for a publishing platform. (Blubrry or Buzzsprout offer packages at this price. But consider spending at least $60/month or more, for more options and better analytics.)
• $18-25/month for a music service. (I love Epidemic Sound and Blue Dot Sessions.)

Total: $69-117/month or $828-1404/year.

Per-episode staff costs: This is your core staff, but it might not be your total staff!

The amount that you’re gonna spend per episode depends on sooo many factors.

• Is your host a volunteer? A professional? A celebrity?
• How many voices will you hear during each episode?
• How complicated is your topic? Do you need to pay for a specialized producer? A fact checker? Legal review?
• How much scripting will you do? Do you only need to write an intro, outro and interview questions? Or is the entire episode going to be narrated, like This American Life?
• How much of a perfectionist are you? Are you going to quibble over every “umm” and “ahh?” Or are you the kind of person who lets things go?
• How complicated is the mix? Are you adding music and sound design? Does your audio need a bunch of post-processing?

In my experience, the biggest variable of all can be the cost of a host. I have worked on a bunch of podcasts where the host is basically a volunteer. But I’ve also seen podcasts where a celebrity host is getting paid $8,000+ per episode, just to spend a few hours in a studio recording scripts written by someone else. It really just depends…

For the purposes of this exercise, let’s assume that the host is a non-celebrity. And if they're getting paid, they’re getting paid for the hours they spend on the project, roughly at the same rate as a senior producer.

With that in mind, here are some ranges for per-episode costs of your podcast, broken out by complexity.

Level 0: Two hosts, chatting.

Don’t confuse this with a show like You’re Wrong About. Yes, that show is “just” two hosts chatting, but a ton of research and planning goes into every episode. And an enormous amount of editing.

What I’m presenting as Level 0 is a very simple, hobbyist level podcast. Let’s assume that the two hosts are doing everything themselves, with no outside support staff.

• Pre production: 1-2 hours

There’s not a lot of prep happening here. Maybe a few emails/texts between the hosts, testing out topics. A very limited amount of research. At most, the hosts might write an outline to guide their conversation.

• Production: 6 hours

For budget purposes, you’ll need to count two hours for the recording. You’re only actually recording for an hour but that’s one hour for each host.

A good rule of thumb is to record twice as much material as you want to use. So record for an hour, but plan to edit that down to 30-ish minutes.

Also, budget 2 hours for VERY minimal editing. We’re talking about the bare minimum here. No fancy restructuring or filler word removal.

And finally, you’ll need at least 2 hours for writing and recording continuity. (Intro, outro, re-tracks, promos, etc.)

• Post Production: 2 hours

We’re just adding continuity and intro/outro music, bouncing and uploading to a podcast publishing platform. I’m not even budgeting for a QC check on this one, which is dangerous.

Total: 9-10 hours per episode.

At Level 0, it’s quite possible that everyone on staff is volunteering their time, so I’m not going to be giving you grand totals for Level 0. But don’t forget…a fully-volunteer podcast is still not free!

You’ll have those start-up and monthly costs, which I’ve already discussed. And if you really want to grow your podcast, you’re gonna have additional costs – theme music, a trailer and promos, marketing costs and maybe a paid consultant – to help you navigate unfamiliar territory.

If you think some of those costs might apply to your hobbyist podcast, keep reading! I’ll get into more detail about how to calculate total costs in a bit.

Level 1: One host, supported by a producer/engineer. 1-2 guests. Just a conversation.

Okay, yeah. I’m calling this “just a conversation,” but we still have our standards, okay? I’m keeping the staff small, to cut down on administrative costs. And I’m not adding a lot of bells and whistles. This is what I would consider to be the bare minimum for making a semi-decent, 30-minute interview episode.

Keep in mind that adding a second guest adds complexity. And complexity = cost.

• Pre production: 2-4 hours

Budget at least 2-4 hours for finding, researching and scheduling guest(s) and writing the interview plan.

• Production: 9-11 hours

At this level, I’m budgeting 2-3 person hours for the recording. (Remember, you’re paying the host and the producer/engineer for recording time!) And with two potential guests, you have a higher likelihood of your recording session starting late and therefore taking longer than an hour.

I’ve budgeted 3-4 hours for editing. This will get you a touch more than the bare minimum, but you’re still not getting a fully polished episode.

Another helpful rule of thumb: Plan for the FIRST edit to take 3x’s the length of your recording. So, an hour’s worth of tape will take 3 hours to rough edit. And that’s just the first pass! Revisions will take more time.

I’ve increased the budget for writing and recording continuity to 2-3 hours. With a bit more time, you can get a bit more creative. But at this level, you still don’t have enough time to write a narrative open or add archive sound.

• Post Production: 5-7 hours

We’re still just adding continuity and intro/outro music. But now the producer/engineer will have enough time to do a little post-processing on the audio, to improve the sound quality. Budget 3 hours for all that.

I’ve added in a QC phase, where the host listens back and gives notes (1 hour) and then the producer/engineer makes changes and uploads the final version to the podcast host (1-3 hours)

Total: 16-22 hours per episode.

Level 2: One host, supported by a producer and engineer. 2-3 guests. Intro and transitions are mixed with music and, potentially, archive audio.

We’re adding some complexity here. The guests might be in conversation with each other, or they might be separate interviews – usually on the same theme – connected by host narration.

We’re also adding some additional bells and whistles. This episode is going to sound much more polished than a Level 1. It might even include some narrative elements!

At this level, you might need to add some more people to your team. Your producer and engineer are probably two different people. And you might have a story editor or supervising producer, to help ensure overall quality.

• Pre production: 6-12 hours

More guests means a bigger budget for finding, researching and scheduling guests and writing interview plans. Also, as your overall quality rises, you’re going to be spending even more time vetting your guests and making sure they’re a good fit. You might even be conducting pre-interviews!

• Production: 16-24 hours

I’m budgeting 4-6 person hours for the recording session(s). Not only do you have multiple guests, but you might also have multiple recording sessions.

The editing budget has been bumped up to 8-12 hours. You’re starting with as much as 2-3 hours worth of tape, and it still needs to be cut down to 30-ish minutes. That’s a LOT of editing!

You’re also going for a much more polished finished product. The editor might be doing significant restructuring. And your host or story editor might be weighing in on the initial edit and asking for changes.

(Just a note here. If you’re editing in Descript, you can probably shave a couple of hours off this estimate. But – and this is very important – you’re going to need to shift some of that time over to your post production budget! Descript makes terrible sounding edits. They will need to be finessed in post.)

I’ve increased the budget for writing and recording continuity to 4-6 hours. This gives you enough time to add a little bit of tape to your intro and transitions. You might pull some archival sound, or you might just pull some clips from one of your interviews to create a short, narrative open.

• Post Production: 8-16 hours

There’s now a lot more for the producer/engineer to do! They have multiple voices to process and many more elements to mix and balance. They’re likely adding music in more places than just the intro and outro. And they might be mixing archival tape montages or other, more complicated elements. Budget 6-8 hours.

The feedback phase is also getting a bit more robust. Rather than just doing a quick QC check, you’re going to want to take a second listen for content, tone and any missed technical issues. This phase can be pretty variable, based on how many people you have listening and how many problems they find. Budget 2-8 hours.

Total: 30-52 hours


Level 3: A fully narrated 25-40 minute narrative with at least 3 sources, archival sound, music and sound design.

You’ll need a host, reporter, producer, story editor, and mix engineer/sound designer. You might benefit from hiring an assistant producer. This is not necessarily six separate people. The host might also be the reporter. The producer might also be handling story editing and mixing/sound design. But even if you’re just a team of two, all of these roles need to be filled.

• Pre production: 10-20 hours

To make a narrative episode, you first have to find and craft a narrative! That means the reporter (or reporter and producer) need to find and research the story and develop a storyboard before they can even think about identifying and scheduling sources and writing multiple interview plans.

• Production: 26-48 hours

Budget at least 6-10 person hours for the recording sessions. Remember that you might need to interview your main source more than once!

You’ll need a bare minimum of 12-20 hours to review all that interview tape, pull cuts/selects and write the first draft of your script. This assumes you have help from Descript or a similar program. Otherwise, budget more time.

Plan for a significant story editing and re-writing phase. This can be super variable, depending on the complexity of the story, the skill of the writer/reporter and, frankly, personalities. Some people are quick to accept edits. Others require significant encouragement. Budget at least 6-16 hours.

I’ve budgeted 2 person hours for the host to record narration, with direction from a producer or voice coach. (One hour of recording for two people.) It’s possible that your host might be more efficient than this, but that has not been my experience.

• Post Production: 30-50 hours

You’re gonna want to budget about 25-40 hours (about an hour per produced minute) for your sound design/mixer to assemble the episode and add music. Again, Descript can speed this up a bit. But the more complexities you work into your episode (SFX? Heavily edited music cues?) the longer it’s going to take.

Plan for a decently robust feedback phase. With more moving parts, you’re going to want more ears on the finished product. 5-10 hours should be enough. But if you have a team that’s extremely picky, you should budget more.


Total: 66-118 hours


Okay, okay…I know what you’re asking. How do you turn those hour estimates into dollar estimates?

The short answer is – take a look at the AIR rate guide. Assign each task to an actual person. Negotiate how much you’re going to pay that person. Math appropriately.

For the purpose of this argument, I’m gonna say that everyone’s getting paid $100/hour.

Why $100/hour?

Well, I could give you a bunch of rigmarole about how everyone's rates will AVERAGE out to $100/hour. And…that argument might actually hold water.

But the truth is, I’m tired. My poor brain has had to do a lot of math. And a big, round number makes everything easier.

After all, I’m really just here to show you HOW to do the math.

The actual math-ing is up to you!

But wait…there’s more!

We've already talked about staff costs, start-up costs (equipment, cover art, show development) and subscription costs. But that’s just the beginning.

Per-Season Costs: Some podcasts take long breaks between seasons, while others are virtually always-on.

Trailer and Promos: These can be a remarkable amount of work, and you’re going to want a new one for each “season” of your podcast. Budget at least $1250-2000.

Marketing/PR/Advertising: Sooo many people try to skip this cost. But please believe me when I say that no one is going to actually find your podcast unless you tell them about it. The days of a podcast becoming a hit simply because it's good are over.

Some say that you should spend an amount equal to your production costs on marketing and PR. I’ve personally never seen that happen.

I’d say you should plan to spend a minimum of $2000-3000 on marketing and PR. But I can’t stress enough how low of an estimate that is. I regularly see budget lines for $20,000-30,000 per season … or more.

Total: $3250 - ????

Percentage-Based Costs: The more you spend, the more you need to spend!

These amounts can’t really be estimated until you know the cost of your podcast. Every situation is different, so you should adjust those figures according to your needs.

Administration: At the end of every project, I ask myself…where did all the money go? The answer? Administrative costs. Finding staff. Hiring staff. Onboarding staff. Getting staff set up in the payroll system. Also, meetings. So many meetings. Coordination. Keeping everyone on task. The size of your staff and complexity of the project really make a difference here, but you should plan to spend a bare minimum of 5% of your staff costs on administration.

Contingencies: Early in my budgeting days, I came across a newsletter by Eric Nuzum that recommended adding 20% to the staff costs of every project to cover unexpected setbacks. Other people say 10% is plenty. But either way, you want to plan for something to go wrong.

Because something will ALWAY go wrong. Trust me on this.

Total: Variable


Additional costs: Other things you might need to consider, depending on your project.

Studio rental fees: Do you need to book a studio for your host? For your guests? Depending on the location, that could set you back $100-350/hour.

Tape syncs: If you want a high quality recording of your guest, without the hassle of a studio, a tape sync is a great option. According to the latest Tape Syncers United rate card, you should plan to pay a minimum of $235 for the first hour, plus travel costs.

Additional equipment: If you want to save some money, but still want a semi-decent sound, consider sending your guest a USB mic. I like to send them something they can keep, as a thank you for appearing on my show. These Fifine mics are a good option. They sound okay..ish. And at $44/each, they’re not going to break the bank.

Licensing Fees: A lot of podcasters rely on “fair use” whenever possible, and I’m not gonna get in the middle of that debate. Leave that one up to the lawyers! But even if you’re a “fair use” devotee, you still might need to set aside some money for archival sound that can’t be sourced through fair use.

Errors and Omissions (E&O) Insurance: Especially if you’re doing journalism (and not just chatting with your BFF about your favorite books) you’re going to want to make sure you and your staff are protected. That means paying for insurance.

Fact Check and Legal Review: If you get E&O insurance, you’ll likely be required to complete fact check and legal review. Sometimes, fact checking can be done by an associate producer in just a few hours. Other times, you might need a professional fact checker whose rates start at $1200/episode. Legal review is also quite variable. My strategy has been to budget $1000/episode and hope to have money left over.

Overhead and Profit: Hey look, I don’t work for free. Neither do you. So it stands to reason that if you hire a production company to produce your podcast, they’re gonna want to make a profit. And they’re gonna have extra overhead. Now…do I know how much all that adds up to? No…I don’t. So I’m not gonna pretend. But if their numbers are higher than mine, don’t freak out.

Other random stuff: Sometimes you’re gonna need to spend money on travel. Or maybe you need to hire a fixer? Or an interpreter? Maybe you want custom music? Yes...I've written thousands of words already, and I still haven't actually gotten around to talking about custom theme music! (Maybe I need to make another post?)

I’m not gonna do the math on these things, because, yeah…this is already too much math for me! But if they apply to you, add them to your total!

I know you must think that we’re done with math by now, but we’re not! Not by a long shot...

If you’re making a serialized narrative (a single story told over multiple episodes) your costs are going to be higher. Much higher.

And if your project is investigative (uncovering a complicated story that’s never been told before) the cost is going to START at $25,000/episode. And that's still quite low. That number could easily double or triple.

These are my favorite types of podcasts to work on. But they almost never actually earn enough money to cover their costs. People make them to fulfill other goals – like building credibility, winning awards or selling the derivative rights to Hollywood.

Let me know if you’re interested in knowing how to think about budgeting that kind of project. I have thoughts, but this has already turned into a tome.

I gotta draw the line somewhere...and it's gonna be here!!

Does your brain hurt from all the math? Yeah, mine too. That’s why God invented spreadsheets!

When I first started pricing podcast work, I would make a new spreadsheet for every project. But now that I’ve gone through this huge exercise, I’ve decided to consolidate all this info into a spreadsheet that will do the math for me.

I’m happy to share, but since I’ve spent literal days of my life on this thing, it’s not free.

Head over to the Narrative Beat Patreon Shop to get access.

Also, if you're a PAID members of the Narrative Beat Patreon, you get access to the spreadsheet for free! Yep…I promised you freebies, and I try to always honor my promises! So if you’re already a member, head on over to Patreon for your link. And if you’re NOT a paid member…consider becoming one!

Oh, and one very last thing, I would have abandoned this project in utter despair if not for the advice and encouragement of a few friends, including Mia Lobel and Willow Belden. All mistakes are mine. And any flashes of brilliance are undoubtedly theirs. Thanks, ladies!