Does Spotify Premium Remove Podcast Ads? (No, Here's What Does)

See how it works See pricing, first 5 episodes free

Jul 3, 2026 - Last update: Sep 11, 2026 - 5 min read

Does Spotify Premium remove podcast ads?

No. Spotify Premium removes ads from music, not from audio podcasts. The ads can still be removed, but only outside Spotify: a clean feed cuts them out of the audio before your app downloads the episode.

Audio podcasts keep their ads whether you pay or not. Spotify’s own support page puts it plainly: Premium subscribers “may receive both Spotify ads and creator sponsorships on audio podcasts.”

Music is a different story: Premium does remove the ads between songs. That’s where the “Premium means no ads” idea comes from.

There’s one podcast exception. Premium subscribers in select markets get video podcasts without Spotify’s own inserted ads. Creator sponsorships stay in even there, and if you’re hearing ads in an audio show, the exception doesn’t apply to you. It isn’t a bug either.

Why Premium doesn’t cover podcast ads

Three reasons, none of them accidental:

Podcast ads are a separate business. Your subscription covers music licensing. Podcast ads are sold on a different market, by different people, at different prices.
Most ads aren’t Spotify’s to remove. Shows insert ads into the audio file itself through dynamic ad insertion at the hosting level. The ad reaches Spotify already baked in. Spotify then inserts ads of its own on top.
Creators earn from ads regardless of your plan. Removing them would mean paying creators out of your subscription. Spotify does exactly that for video podcasts in select markets, and only there.

So “Premium = ad-free” was always a music promise. It just doesn’t say that on the label. What that leaves in place is measurable: we cut 900 hours of ads out of more than 10,000 episodes in three weeks.

Spotify documents all of this on its Podcasts and shows support page.

Can you block podcast ads inside Spotify?

No. Spotify doesn’t accept external RSS feeds, so there’s no way to swap in a clean version of a show. Ad blockers don’t work either. The ads are inside the audio stream, not separate requests a blocker could filter. The skip button is the only tool Spotify gives you, and it’s you doing the skipping, every ad break, every episode.

How to get rid of ads on Spotify podcasts

The listening has to happen outside Spotify. Four steps, about 20 minutes the first time:

Pick an app that follows a feed by URL. Apple Podcasts, Pocket Casts, Overcast or Podcast Addict all do. Spotify and Amazon Music don’t, so they can’t play a clean feed.
Move your shows. There’s no export button, so you search for each show and follow it in the new app. Moving your podcasts off Spotify walks through it.
Get the clean feed. Sign up at zeroads.ai and add a show. Your first 5 episodes play free in the ZeroAds web player. Subscribe, and each show you add gets its own private clean feed URL. ZeroAds finds the ad segments in each episode’s audio and cuts them out. In our accuracy tests against hand-labeled episodes it catches about 97-98% of ad time, and about 85% of every second it cuts lands on labeled ad time.
Follow the clean feed in your new app. Same show, same episodes, no ads. Every cut is listed with timestamps in an episode report you can check.

Spotify itself stays as it was for music. More on the move, app by app: how to get rid of ads on Spotify podcasts.

Before signing up, browse sample episode reports from a small selection of public shows we’ve already processed. Each report lists the detected cuts with timestamps. Detection can miss ads or cut other audio.

Hear it on your own shows first. Try ZeroAds. Your first 5 episodes are free

Prefer the whole thing on one page? Ad-free podcasts in the app you already use covers the feed, the apps, and the price.

FAQ

Why does Spotify Premium still have ads on podcasts? Podcast ads are sold separately from your music subscription. Most are inserted into the audio by the show’s hosting service, so they play for everyone, Premium or not. Spotify’s own support page says audio podcasts may carry both Spotify ads and creator sponsorships for Premium subscribers.

Do video podcasts on Spotify have ads for Premium users? Spotify removes its own inserted ads from video podcasts for Premium subscribers in select markets. Creator sponsorships stay in, and audio podcasts keep all of their ads.

Does Spotify Premium have ads at all? Not on music. Premium removes the ads between songs. Audio podcasts are different: Spotify says Premium listeners may still hear both Spotify ads and creator sponsorships in them.

How do I get rid of ads on Spotify podcasts? Inside Spotify, you can’t. Spotify accepts no outside feeds. The working route is a standard podcast app (Apple Podcasts, Pocket Casts, Overcast, Podcast Addict) plus a clean feed from a service like ZeroAds, which cuts the ads out of the audio before the episode downloads. Our Spotify guide has the details.

Can you skip podcast ads on Spotify? Only by hand, with the skip button, every ad break, every episode. There is no setting that removes them. A clean feed in another app removes them before you press play.

What about everything else?

For speed-listening tricks, per-creator subscriptions, and the full comparison of what works and what doesn’t, see the complete guide to removing podcast ads. For how Apple Podcasts compares on the same question, read does Apple Podcasts have ads?