Niche sports podcasts are delivering stronger advertising sales results than shows focused on major leagues, according to new data from Oxford Road.
The agency has published its ORBIT Top 15 Performing Sports Podcasts and Top 5 Sports Networks rankings, based on 12 months of campaign outcomes drawn from more than $1.6 billion in spend across 500 advertisers.
While flagship leagues such as the NFL, NBA and MLB dominate headlines, Oxford Road says shows centred on those competitions often underperform on measurable sales impact. Instead, 67% of the top performing sports podcasts in its ranking focus on niche disciplines.
Motorsports accounts for more than a quarter of the Top 15, making it the single most represented genre. Oxford Road says the category benefits from an eight-month season that sustains audience momentum, rather than short spikes around tentpole events.
Fantasy sports also ranks highly, but the data suggests performance improves outside the regular NFL season.
According to the analysis, the NFL off season delivers 2.4 times the in season performance, which Oxford Road attributes to lower ad crowding combined with sustained listening from committed fans.
Daily sports podcasts placed first and second in the show rankings. The agency says daily formats create habitual listening and time sensitive engagement, offering advertisers repeated exposure and the opportunity to run sequential messaging.
Participatory sports, including golf, fantasy and hunting, make up 45% of the Top 15 despite representing a smaller share of the overall sports media market. Oxford Road argues that listeners seeking instruction or advice are more likely to act on host recommendations.
Dan Granger, chief executive officer of Oxford Road, said: “Conventional wisdom would have you buy the usual suspects, the biggest sports shows during the biggest moments. We see it differently. If you’re a performance advertiser, this won’t surprise you: the counter-intuitive play is almost always the right one.”
The findings were generated using ORBIT, the Oxford Road Benchmark Intelligence Tool, which measures customer acquisition costs, return on ad spend and sales results from real campaigns.
Oxford Road says it will release updated rankings each month across multiple genres and markets.
