You Already Have a YouTube Channel. Here's How to Turn It Into a Podcast
You've been publishing interviews, conversations, or commentary on YouTube. Your audience watches. But there's another audience you're missing — the people who would listen to your content if they could get it in their podcast app. They're commuting, running, walking the dog, doing dishes. They don't want to watch a screen. They want to press play and listen.
The traditional path to launching a podcast is painful: export audio from your video editor, upload to a podcast host, write show notes, submit to directories, manage two publishing workflows indefinitely. Most creators try it, get tired of the double workload, and stop updating the podcast feed. Their Spotify page goes stale while YouTube stays current.
There's a simpler way.
How It Works
- Download Castify (free, for macOS, Windows, and Linux)
- Paste your YouTube channel or playlist URL
- Castify extracts the audio and creates a podcast RSS feed
- Submit the feed URL to Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, and other directories
- New episodes are added to the feed automatically as you publish on YouTube
No editing. No re-exporting. No second upload. No hosting fees.
Why You Should Distribute as a Podcast
You're leaving audience on the table. Not everyone uses YouTube. Podcast listeners are a distinct audience with distinct habits. They subscribe, they listen to every episode, and they listen start to finish. YouTube viewers bounce, skip, and get pulled into recommendations. Podcast listeners stay.
Podcast listeners are more loyal. Podcast subscribers have among the highest engagement rates of any medium. The average podcast listener completes 80%+ of each episode. On YouTube, average watch time for a 60-minute video is under 40%. Different platform, different behavior, both valuable.
Discovery works differently. YouTube is algorithmic — you're competing for attention in a feed of infinite distractions. Podcast apps are intentional — listeners choose to subscribe and the app delivers your episodes directly. There's no algorithm burying you under trending content.
It costs you nothing. Your content already exists. The audio is already good (you mic'd up for YouTube). The only question is whether you want to reach the audience that prefers audio.
What Kind of YouTube Content Works as a Podcast?
Not every YouTube video makes a good podcast episode. Content that is primarily conversation and voice works perfectly. Content that depends on visuals does not.
| Works Great | Doesn't Work |
|---|---|
| Interviews and conversations | Tutorials with screen recordings |
| Commentary and analysis | Product reviews (unboxing, visual demos) |
| Roundtable discussions | Travel vlogs |
| Lectures and presentations | Cooking videos |
| News and current events | Gaming content |
| Storytelling and narrative | Music videos |
| Q&A sessions | Art and craft tutorials |
The Problem With the Traditional Approach
Every podcast hosting platform — Anchor, Buzzsprout, Podbean, RSS.com — requires you to manage a separate publishing pipeline:
Record → Edit video → Export video for YouTube → Upload to YouTube → Export audio separately → Upload audio to podcast host → Write podcast show notes → Publish podcast episode
That's eight steps. Steps 5 through 8 are pure overhead — work you're doing only to serve the podcast feed. It adds 30–60 minutes per episode. For a weekly show, that's 2–4 hours per month of busywork.
Most creators maintain this for a few months, then quietly stop. The YouTube channel keeps going. The podcast feed goes stale. Their audience on Apple Podcasts sees "last episode: 6 months ago" and moves on.
With Castify, your workflow stays exactly what it is today:
Record → Edit → Upload to YouTube
That's it. Castify handles the rest.
Use a Playlist to Curate Your Podcast Feed
Not every video on your channel belongs in a podcast. You might have short clips, behind-the-scenes content, or visual-heavy videos mixed in with your interview episodes.
The solution: create a YouTube playlist with only the episodes you want in your podcast feed, then point Castify at the playlist instead of the full channel. Add a video to the playlist when you publish, and it appears in the feed. Don't add it, and it doesn't.
This gives you editorial control over your podcast without changing anything about your YouTube publishing workflow.
Where to Submit Your Feed
Once Castify creates your RSS feed URL, submit it to these directories to reach the widest audience:
| Platform | How to Submit |
|---|---|
| Apple Podcasts | Submit via Apple Podcasts Connect (podcasters.apple.com) |
| Spotify | Submit via Spotify for Podcasters (podcasters.spotify.com) |
| Podcast Index | Submit at podcastindex.org — powers many third-party apps |
| Pocket Casts | Picks up from Apple Podcasts and Podcast Index automatically |
| Overcast | Picks up from Apple Podcasts automatically |
| Google Podcasts / YouTube Music | Indexes from RSS automatically once available in other directories |
Submit to Apple Podcasts and Podcast Index first. Most other apps pull from those two sources.
What About Monetization?
Adding a podcast feed doesn't interfere with your YouTube revenue. Your YouTube views, watch time, and ad revenue are unaffected — podcast listeners are incremental audience, not cannibalization.
On the podcast side, once your feed has traction you can explore:
Dynamic ad insertion — Services like Podcorn, AdvertiseCast, or Spotify Ad Analytics can insert ads into your podcast feed based on listener count.
Sponsorship reads — If you already do sponsor reads in your YouTube videos, those are baked into the audio and carry over to the podcast automatically. You're effectively double-dipping on the same sponsorship.
Premium content — Platforms like Apple Podcasts Subscriptions and Patreon let you offer bonus episodes to paying subscribers.
Will This Affect My YouTube Channel?
No. Castify works from your published, public videos. It does not:
• Affect your view count, watch time, or algorithm ranking
• Require API access or channel permissions
• Change anything about your YouTube content
• Compete with your YouTube audience
Podcast listeners and YouTube viewers are largely different audiences with different consumption habits. The overlap is smaller than you'd expect. You're adding reach, not splitting it.
Who's Already Doing This?
The biggest shows in podcasting started as (or became) YouTube-first and distribute audio separately:
Joe Rogan — films on YouTube, audio distributed as a podcast. 15M+ subscribers on YouTube, still one of the top audio podcasts.
Lex Fridman — full interviews on YouTube, audio feed on every podcast platform.
All-In Podcast — records video, distributes audio to podcast apps.
Huberman Lab — YouTube-native, massive podcast audience in parallel.
These are shows with full production teams and dedicated podcast operations. With Castify, a solo creator gets the same distribution without any of the overhead.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do I turn my YouTube channel into a podcast? Download Castify, paste your channel URL, and submit the generated RSS feed to Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Podcast Index.
Do I need to re-edit my videos? No. Castify extracts audio directly from your published videos. If your content sounds good without video, it's ready.
Is Castify free? Yes. Free for macOS, Windows, and Linux.
Can I choose which videos go in the podcast feed? Yes. Point Castify at a YouTube playlist instead of your full channel. Only videos in that playlist will appear in the feed.
How fast do new episodes appear? After you publish a video to YouTube, it appears in your podcast feed once Castify processes it.
Will my YouTube analytics be affected? No. Castify doesn't interact with YouTube's systems in a way that affects your analytics or algorithm ranking.
Can I add podcast-specific metadata? The feed automatically uses your video titles, descriptions, and thumbnails. You can customize the feed name and description in Castify.
What if I already have a dead podcast feed on Spotify? You can either update your existing feed URL to point to the new Castify-generated feed, or submit the new feed as a fresh show and retire the old one.
Turn Your YouTube Channel Into a Podcast
Your content already exists. Your audience is waiting. Free forever.
Download Castify