Darknet Diaries stats and analytics for 2023
Jan 1, 2023 - Dec 31, 2023
Total downloads (measured by Megaphone and verified by Podtrac)
18,506,990
Down by 9.1 mil from 2022
Downloads per day
Each spike you see is because and episode was released on that day. The blue is this year the purple is last year’s daily download stats.
We saw a decline in downloads this year. Last year’s total was 27,677,785. So a 33% drop. There’s a clear reason for this. Last year we published 24 episodes. This year we published 9.
Despite the drastic slowdown in releasing new episodes, the number of subscribers has gone up. The average episode gets about 700,000 downloads now, which is up from 600k last year.
However, despite seeing a 33% drop in podcast stats, that doesn’t include YouTube stats, and YouTube saw a 500% increase. So adding it all up, we did see a rise in overall downloads/views/listen.
We now have real time stats, updated daily. You can see the top episodes here: https://darknetdiaries.com/top.
Monthly downloads all time.
Zooming out, looking at monthly downloads over the last 5 years you can see how the slow down in production has impacted overall downloads. This is not something we’re worried about, as the slower release schedule is the right pace for us to continue to deliver high quality content without facing any burnout.
The monetization of the podcast is still doing well. We have all the resources we need to continue delivering the show.
Notable 2023 Events
- The podcast was mentioned in the acknowledgements of the popular book Zero Days by Ruth Ware.
- The show won Best Cyber Podcast of the year from at The Real Cyber Awards.
- DEFCON was an amazing time. Most fulfilling and best weekend ever.
- Written up in Cybercrime Magazine
- Appeared as a guest on about a dozen other podcasts.
- An episode of the show got turned into a comic by the wonderful people at Black Hills Infosec.
User Agent/App
| APPLICATION | DOWNLOADS | % OF TOTAL |
| Spotify | 6,759,872 | 37% |
| Apple Podcasts | 4,696,933 | 25% |
| Google Podcasts on Android | 1,486,729 | 8% |
| AppleCoreMedia | 1,116,763 | 6% |
| Pocket Casts | 762,159 | 4% |
| Chrome | 675,224 | 4% |
| Podcast Addict | 463,296 | 3% |
| Overcast | 345,461 | 2% |
Country
| COUNTRY | DOWNLOADS | % OF TOTAL |
| United States | 8,270,008 | 45% |
| United Kingdom | 1,629,014 | 9% |
| Australia | 1,355,647 | 7% |
| Germany | 1,067,690 | 6% |
| Canada | 1,004,085 | 5% |
| Sweden | 564,863 | 3% |
| Netherlands | 555,848 | 3% |
| Norway | 302,664 | 2% |
| Denmark | 296,213 | 2% |
| India | 275,598 | 1% |
| Switzerland | 224,556 | 1% |
Top Episode of All Time
| 100: NSO | 1,013,780 |
| 112: Dirty Coms | 1,002,295 |
| Ep 1: The Phreaky World of PBX Hacking | 974,841 |
| 99: The Spy | 965,755 |
| 92: The Pirate Bay | 953,135 |
| 110: Spam Botnets | 870,951 |
| 116: Mad Dog | 868,826 |
| 102: Money Maker | 864,764 |
| 114: HD | 852,785 |
This year marks the first time an episode hit a million downloads!
YouTube
Ok so in 2022 we started uploading episodes to YouTube and got 3 million total views. In 2023 the YouTube channel saw 15,181,007 views! That’s pretty much the same as the podcast stats. In some months YouTube is outperforming the podcast.
So while the podcast side of things went down by 9 million downloads in 2023, we gained 13 million downloads from YouTube. So a net overall is that total downloads grew from 2022 to 2023 despite the drastic slowdown. (Stats are confusing I know, but YouTube and podcast stats are always separate, just like how Twitter/Instagram/Facebook listens aren’t in the total either).
So with 18,506,990 podcast downloads and 15,181,007 YouTube views, we technically had a total of 33,687,997 downloads/views/listens in 2023.
One video had over 1 million views!
2023 started with 116k YouTube subs and ended with 309,000.
Plans/goals for 2024:
- New episodes out first Tuesday of every month. 12 total for the year.
- A few extra YouTube videos are in the works. YouTube seems experimental to us still, so why not throw some stuff up there with our new found audience and see what happens.
- With the slowed down pace, it is allowing us to be creative in other areas. There may be something totally new that comes out from Jack Rhysider in 2024.
The best is still yet to come! We’re just getting started! Here’s to an exciting 2024.