Top 100 Hot Podcast Episodes of 2019
For the third year in a row, Breaker is releasing a list of our hottest episodes of the year. However, this year, we’ve made a few changes. In 2017 and 2018, our lists only contained the top 25 episode. Since there were so many great episodes in 2019, we’ve decided to expand the list to 100 episodes. Also new this year: we’re releasing the list as a Breaker playlist. Playlists were one of many new features Breaker released this year and we’re excited to use it to bring you this year’s top 100. If you have upcoming travel plans this holiday season, I’d encourage you to follow this playlist and give these episodes a listen (or a re-listen).
Without further ado, here’s a playlist of the top 100 hottest episodes on Breaker in 2019.
Trends
We’ve noticed several trends that we wanted to highlight in this year’s list…
Naval
AngelList founder Naval Ravikant’s eponymous podcast, Naval, on wealth creation, released 55 bite-sized episodes in 2019, most of which were only 4 or 5 minutes long. This made the content quick and easy to consume, and easier to re-listen and share. This format innovation allowed Naval to claim sixteen(!) of the top 100 spots, including the #2 spot, which was the compilation of all his short episodes into a single, 2-hour-and-48-minute mega-episode. The only podcast ahead of the Naval podcast was an episode of The Joe Rogan Experience…with Naval Ravikant. Naval dominated the podcast game in 2019. We tip our hat to him.
#2. How to Get Rich: Every Episode — Naval
How I Built This
For the third year in a row, How I Built This with Guy Raz has made an impressive showing on the list, with twelve of the top 100 spots, including interviews with Shopify founder Tobias Lütke, Headspace founders Andy Puddicombe and Rich Pierson, Peloton founder John Foley, Away founder Jen Rubio, SoulCycle founders Julie Rice and Elizabeth Cutler, and Canva founder Melanie Perkins.
#46. Away: Jen Rubio
Invest Like the Best
After claiming two spots in the top 25 in 2017 and then missing the top 25 last year, Invest Like the Best with Patrick O’Shaughnessy made a strong return in 2019 with eight episodes in the top 100, including two interviews with Bill Gurley of Benchmark, Instagram founders Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger, and Bottomless founder Michael Mayer.
#7. Bill Gurley — All Things Business and Investing
The Tim Ferriss Show
Also returning to list after falling off in 2018 was The Tim Ferriss Show, with seven episodes in the top 100, including interviews with Jim Collins, Eric Schmidt, and Ben Horowitz.
#56. Ben Horowitz — What You Do Is Who You Are
The Joe Rogan Experience
Joe Rogan took six of the top 100 spots, with his temerarious interviews of notable people, including Twitter and Square CEO Jack Dorsey, presidential candidates Bernie Sanders and Andrew Yang, and comedian and actor Kevin Hart.
#1. Naval Ravikant
Startup founders
The Breaker community is made up of a large number of startup founders, so it didn’t surprise us that so many of the top 100 episodes were interviews with other founders. In addition to the episodes mentioned above, the Acquired podcast released a great interview with Superhuman CEO Rahul Vohra, Kara Swisher from Recode Decode interviewed Basecamp CEO Jason Fried, and the Y Combinator Podcast interviewed Lambda School founder Austen Allred.
#37. Basecamp CEO Jason Fried on overfunded startups and stressful workplaces — Recode Decode
Venture capitalists
Interviews with venture capitalists were also very popular on Breaker. Leading this trend was Eric Weinstein’s interview with Founders Fund’s Peter Thiel in the debut episode of his podcast The Portal. Three interviews with Keith Rabois made the top 100: Venture Stories, Recode Decode, and the North Star Podcast. Marc Andreessen’s interview with Brian Koppelman on The Moment also made the list. The a16z podcast also appeared three times.
#39. Marc Andreessen–The Moment with Brian Koppelman
Not-so-techie stuff
Of course, not all of the top 100 episodes where about tech startups. Hidden Brain made five appearances on the list, as did TED Talks Daily, and four for Planet Money. I particularly enjoyed the episode of 99% Invisible on Invisible Women, The Seven Minute Rule from Against the Rules with Michael Lewis, and The Tortoise and the Hare from Revisionist History.
#63. The Seven Minute Rule — Against the Rules with Michael Lewis
Interviews
Overall, interviews were the most popular format of show on Breaker, representing over half of the top 100 episodes of the year.
This will probably be our last blog post of the decade. Hope you had a good one! 🎆
