The 15 Best Entertainment Podcasts (2026)

Pop Culture Happy Hour has been NPR's go-to source for entertainment recommendations since 2010, and it shows no signs of slowing down. The show runs four days a week, with hosts Linda Holmes, Glen Weldon, Stephen Thompson, and Aisha Harris rotating through episodes that cover movies, TV, music, books, and video games. Each host brings a distinct perspective — Linda's warmth and literary background, Glen's sharp comic book expertise, Stephen's musical knowledge, and Aisha's film criticism chops — which keeps the conversation lively without ever turning combative.

The format is tightly produced at around 25 minutes per episode, making it easy to slot into a lunch break or short commute. A typical week might include a review of whatever just topped the box office, a deep look at a buzzy streaming series, and a recommendation segment where each panelist champions something the others might have missed. The show also brings in rotating guest critics who add fresh takes and broader cultural context.

What makes this podcast stand out from the sea of pop culture shows is its genuine enthusiasm. The hosts clearly love what they cover, and disagreements play out as spirited conversations rather than scorched-earth takedowns. NPR's production polish is evident throughout — clean audio, smart editing, and just enough structure to keep things moving. The Pop Culture Happy Hour+ subscription tier offers a sponsor-free feed for listeners who want the pure experience. With well over a decade of episodes in the archive, newcomers have a massive back catalog to explore.

Bill Simmons and a rotating crew from The Ringer sit down each week to dissect movies that hold up to repeated viewings — the kind of films you stop for every time they pop up on cable. With more than 300 movies covered since the show launched, the archive alone is a treasure for film fans. Episodes break each movie down through a set of recurring categories like the "Dion Waiters Award" for the best scene-stealer, "Apex Mountain" for career peaks, and "Recasting Couch" for hypothetical casting swaps, which gives every discussion a playful competitive edge.

The regular roster includes Chris Ryan, Sean Fennessey, and Craig Horlbeck, each bringing different cinematic taste that sparks genuine debate. Bill's sports-minded analogies collide with Sean's film-school depth, and the chemistry between the various host combinations keeps the show from ever feeling formulaic. One week they might tackle Pulp Fiction, the next it's a mid-90s action movie most people forgot about.

A major development hit in early 2026 when Netflix and Spotify announced a deal to bring The Rewatchables to Netflix as a video podcast, giving the show a visual dimension it never had before. The production from The Ringer is consistent and energetic, with episodes running 60 to 90 minutes — long enough to go deep but not so long that they drag. If you have strong opinions about which John Carpenter movie is the most rewatchable, this is your podcast.

Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins host The Big Picture, The Ringer's flagship film podcast that treats movies with the seriousness of art criticism and the fun of a bar conversation. Episodes drop twice a week, covering everything from Oscar contenders and box office analysis to top-five lists and movie drafts that get surprisingly heated. Sean's background as a filmmaker and critic gives the show a level of depth you won't find on most movie podcasts, while Amanda's sharp cultural commentary and dry humor provide the perfect counterbalance.

The show regularly features guests from The Ringer universe — Chris Ryan, Van Lathan, and Bill Simmons all rotate in — plus occasional interviews with directors, actors, and screenwriters. Their annual traditions have become appointment listening: the end-of-year rankings, the Oscar predictions episodes, and the anticipated-films draft where Sean and Amanda count down their most-awaited releases for the coming year.

What separates The Big Picture from other film podcasts is its willingness to engage with the movie industry as a business, not just an art form. Sean and Amanda regularly discuss streaming economics, studio strategy, and the changing theatrical landscape alongside their reviews. A recent episode saw them debating whether a period drama could realistically contend for Best Picture against bigger-budget competition, the kind of insider analysis that makes the show essential during awards season. Production quality from The Ringer is sharp throughout, and episodes run around an hour — substantial enough for real discussion without becoming exhausting.

Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang started Las Culturistas in 2016 as two friends obsessing over pop culture, and it has grown into one of the most celebrated comedy podcasts in the country. The show won iHeart Radio's Podcast of the Year in both 2023 and 2025, and an episode featuring Lady Gaga was named one of Apple Podcasts' best episodes of 2025. The format is loose and conversational — Matt and Bowen riff on whatever is happening in entertainment, celebrity culture, and their own lives, with recurring segments like "I Don't Think So, Honey" where they each deliver passionate rants about cultural pet peeves.

Both hosts have careers outside the podcast that feed directly into the show's appeal. Bowen is a cast member on Saturday Night Live, while Matt is a comedian, actor, and singer with a growing film career. In late 2025, the pair announced they're writing and starring in an untitled comedy for Searchlight Pictures. Their annual Culture Awards ceremony has expanded to a full Bravo television special, now in its fourth year.

The show is produced through Will Ferrell's Big Money Players network and distributed by iHeartPodcasts, which gives it a wide reach. Episodes run about an hour and feature a steady stream of celebrity guests — comedians, musicians, and actors who are clearly friends rather than promotional stops. The energy between Matt and Bowen is infectious without being performative, and their queer perspective on mainstream culture gives the show a point of view that feels specific and authentic.

Keep It! launched on Crooked Media in January 2018 as a weekly show examining pop culture and politics through a queer lens, and it quickly carved out a devoted audience. The show was originally co-hosted by Ira Madison III and Louis Virtel, whose chemistry and razor-sharp cultural commentary made it appointment listening for anyone interested in Hollywood, music, and the intersection of entertainment with social issues.

In July 2025, Ira Madison III departed the show after seven years, with his final episode fittingly titled "The End of an Ira." Since then, Louis Virtel has continued as the primary host, bringing in a rotating cast of guest co-hosts who keep the conversation fresh. Louis is an Emmy-nominated TV writer with an encyclopedic knowledge of pop culture history — he can pivot from a detailed breakdown of Oscar campaigns to a passionate defense of a 1990s one-hit wonder without missing a beat.

Each episode runs about an hour and tackles the week's biggest entertainment stories with a mix of genuine criticism and comedic commentary. The show doesn't just report on celebrity news; it contextualizes it, pulling in threads about representation, industry politics, and cultural shifts. The Crooked Media production is clean and professional, and the show's willingness to have actual opinions — not just hot takes — gives it more substance than your average entertainment recap. Keep It! remains one of the sharpest pop culture podcasts around, even as it navigates a significant transition in its hosting lineup.

Andy Greenwald and Chris Ryan have been friends since long before they started hosting The Watch together, and that genuine rapport is the engine that drives the show. Both are pop culture addicts with serious credentials — Andy is a former TV critic and showrunner who worked on Legion and Briarpatch, while Chris is an editor and podcaster at The Ringer who seems to have watched literally everything. Together they break down the latest in TV, movies, and music twice a week, blending critical analysis with the kind of unguarded enthusiasm that only comes from people who genuinely love what they're talking about.

The show covers new releases and ongoing series with a focus on television, making it an ideal companion for anyone trying to navigate the overwhelming number of shows across streaming platforms. Recent episodes have tackled prestige dramas like The Pitt and Industry alongside broader discussions about where the TV industry is heading. Their year-end best-of roundups and Golden Globes coverage are particularly strong, offering informed opinions without the stuffiness that can plague awards-season podcasting.

Episodes typically run about an hour and benefit from The Ringer's polished production. What keeps listeners coming back is the dynamic between the two hosts — Andy tends to be the more analytical voice while Chris leans into emotional reactions, and the push-pull between those styles makes even a conversation about a mediocre streaming show worth hearing. The Watch treats television as something worth taking seriously without ever forgetting that it's supposed to be fun.

Bobby Finger and Lindsey Weber built Who? Weekly on a simple, brilliant premise: celebrities fall into two categories — "Whos" (the ones you vaguely recognize but can't quite place) and "Thems" (the ones everyone knows). Each week the hosts sort through the latest celebrity news, paparazzi photos, and tabloid stories to figure out who matters, who doesn't, and why we care in the first place. The show celebrated its tenth anniversary in 2025, which is a remarkable run for an independent podcast that started as a side project.

The format mixes structured segments with listener call-ins via the show's dedicated phone line (619-WHO-THEM), where fans leave voicemails asking for help identifying random celebrities or sharing their own celebrity sightings. Bobby and Lindsey's banter is quick and informed — they track celebrity careers with an almost academic rigor, noticing patterns in PR campaigns and talent management that casual observers would miss entirely.

Episodes run about an hour and land weekly, covering a mix of genuine celebrity news and the kind of fringe entertainment stories that bigger outlets ignore. A typical episode might jump from analyzing a reality TV contestant's Instagram strategy to debating whether a particular actor has crossed from Who to Them status. The production is clean and straightforward, letting the hosts' chemistry and knowledge do the heavy lifting. For anyone who enjoys celebrity culture but wants something smarter than a standard gossip roundup, Who? Weekly fills a niche that nobody else really occupies.

Entertainment Weekly's What To Watch does exactly what the name promises: it tells you what's worth watching across network TV, cable, premium channels, and streaming platforms. Hosted by Gerrad Hall, the show runs daily, which sets it apart from most entertainment podcasts that drop once or twice a week. That frequency means it can react to new releases in near real-time rather than looking backward at shows that premiered days ago.

Each episode is concise — usually around 10 to 15 minutes — making it an easy daily listen rather than a time commitment. Gerrad walks through the day's notable premieres, finales, and special events with brief recommendations and context about why each show might be worth your time. The tone is informative without being preachy, offering enough detail to help you decide what to watch without spoiling anything.

The Entertainment Weekly brand gives the show access to a broad editorial perspective. Rather than focusing exclusively on prestige TV or genre content, What To Watch covers the full spectrum — a new Netflix drama and a network reality competition might get equal attention in the same episode. The production is clean and professional, with Gerrad and editor Samee Junio keeping the show tight and focused. For cord-cutters and streaming subscribers overwhelmed by the sheer volume of content available every day, this podcast functions as a reliable daily filter that saves you the trouble of scrolling through platform homepages trying to figure out what's new and what's actually good.

Knox McCoy and Jamie Golden have been hosting The Popcast since August 2013, and with over 700 episodes in the catalog, they've built a community around one simple motto: educating people on things that entertain but do not matter. The show takes pop culture seriously enough to be informative while never losing sight of the fact that most of it is fundamentally silly. That balance is harder to strike than it sounds, and Knox and Jamie pull it off consistently.

Each weekly episode focuses on a specific pop culture topic — it might be ranking fast food chains, debating the best rom-coms of the 2000s, or predicting which celebrities will have career comebacks in the coming year. The structured approach gives episodes a clear focus that keeps the conversation from drifting, and the hosts' opposing taste profiles create natural friction. Knox tends to lean toward action movies and sports culture while Jamie gravitates toward reality TV and music, so they rarely agree on anything outright.

The show has also grown into a live event, with The Popcast Live touring to cities like Dallas and Chicago for two-hour stage shows that sell out consistently. The production is hosted on Acast and keeps things straightforward — no elaborate sound design, just two friends talking with enough chemistry to carry an hour. The Popcast occupies a sweet spot between surface-level celebrity gossip and overly analytical cultural criticism, making it accessible to casual listeners while rewarding loyal fans who catch the running jokes built up over a decade of episodes.

The Ringer-Verse is actually a multi-show feed that bundles several programs covering superheroes, fandom, and nerd culture under one umbrella. The main draw is The Midnight Boys, hosted by Van Lathan, Charles Holmes, Jomi Adeniran, and Steve Ahlman, who deliver instant reactions and theory breakdowns whenever a major franchise drops new content — Marvel movies, DC shows, Star Wars series, and everything in between. Their coverage of the Avengers: Doomsday buildup in early 2026 is a good example of how the show handles big-event fandom.

Alongside The Midnight Boys, the feed includes Mint Edition, where Steve and Jomi gather every other week with guests to share unique takes on movies and shows, and Button Mash, where Ben Lindbergh and guests tackle the video game world. The Button Mash segment covered Fallout Season 2 and ran a 2025 Games of the Year draft, giving the feed broader appeal beyond just comic book properties.

The Ringer-Verse also puts out monthly recommendation episodes that highlight what the hosts are watching and playing outside their usual coverage areas. Recent picks have included horror sequels and indie films alongside the expected blockbuster fare. Episodes vary in length from 30 minutes to over an hour depending on the topic, and the production benefits from The Ringer's established infrastructure. For fans who want thoughtful commentary on franchise entertainment rather than just hype or negativity, The Ringer-Verse offers a grounded perspective from hosts who clearly know the source material inside and out.

Mallory Rubin and Joanna Robinson are two of the most knowledgeable voices in fandom podcasting, and House of R gives them room to explore fictional universes with the depth those worlds deserve. The show is a spiritual successor to Binge Mode, their earlier podcast that built a massive following through exhaustive breakdowns of Game of Thrones and Harry Potter. House of R broadens the scope to cover Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Marvel, and whatever else captures their attention, with recurring formats like Deep Dives, Tropes Courses, Hall of Fame inductions, and Hype Meters.

Mal and Jo bring an infectious enthusiasm to every episode that goes beyond simple fandom cheerleading. Their coverage of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms in early 2026 broke down individual episodes with the kind of detail — tracking character arcs, catching book references, analyzing visual storytelling — that rewards both casual viewers and obsessive fans. They've also brought in colleagues like Sean Fennessey and Chris Ryan for special crossover episodes and drafts.

The show features a good mix of reactive coverage and evergreen content. One week it might be a breakdown of the latest episode of a running series, the next a nostalgic revisitation of a beloved franchise or a countdown of top moments from the previous year. Episodes can run long — often past 90 minutes for major Deep Dives — but the enthusiasm never flags. Mallory, who serves as head of editorial at The Ringer, brings institutional knowledge of every franchise she covers, and Joanna's journalism background ensures the analysis stays grounded even when the subject matter is pure fantasy.

Hot Hollywood takes the celebrity reporting that Us Weekly has been doing for decades and condenses it into a weekly podcast. Hosted by Travis Cronin, the show pulls from the magazine's editorial team to break down the biggest entertainment stories of the week — celebrity breakups, red carpet moments, reality TV drama, and the kind of tabloid-worthy stories that Us Weekly has always excelled at covering.

The format is straightforward news-and-commentary, with Travis walking through each story and adding context from Us Weekly's reporting and source network. Episodes run around 30 minutes, keeping things brisk enough that you get caught up on Hollywood gossip without committing to a long listen. The show benefits from Us Weekly's established entertainment journalism infrastructure, which means the stories are generally sourced rather than speculative, giving it a slight edge in credibility over podcasts that rely on social media rumors.

The production is solid and consistent, distributed through Art19. With a 4.3-star rating on Apple Podcasts, the show has found a reliable audience among listeners who want their celebrity news in podcast form without the snark or irony that many entertainment shows lean on. Hot Hollywood is not trying to reinvent entertainment journalism — it's delivering a familiar product in a convenient format. For people who used to flip through Us Weekly at the grocery store checkout, this podcast fills that same role, updated for 2026 and available on demand.

Dax Holt and Adam Glyn bring insider access to Hollywood Raw that most entertainment podcasts simply cannot match. Both hosts have backgrounds in the paparazzi and entertainment journalism world, which means their celebrity interviews and industry stories come with a ground-level perspective you won't find from traditional media outlets. The show bills itself as real, raw, and uncensored, and the conversations do tend to go places that more polished shows avoid.

The guest list is what sets Hollywood Raw apart. Rather than sticking to actors doing press tours, Dax and Adam regularly sit down with paparazzi photographers, celebrity bodyguards, private flight attendants, and other behind-the-scenes figures who see the entertainment industry from angles the public rarely hears about. Those conversations reveal how the celebrity machine actually works — the planned pap walks, the PR strategies, the logistics of fame — and they're often more interesting than the celebrity interviews themselves.

Episodes release weekly and run about an hour, produced by Hurrdat Media out of Omaha, Nebraska, which gives the show an outsider sensibility despite its Hollywood subject matter. The production is straightforward and conversational, prioritizing the flow of discussion over heavy editing. Hollywood Raw is best suited for listeners who enjoy celebrity culture but want a peek behind the curtain rather than just consuming the finished product. The show has built a consistent audience since launching in 2018, with Dax and Adam's chemistry and industry connections keeping the content pipeline fresh.

Still Processing began in 2016 as a New York Times culture podcast co-hosted by Wesley Morris and Jenna Wortham, and it earned a loyal following for its thoughtful, often deeply personal approach to covering movies, music, television, and the broader cultural mood. The show went on hiatus in late 2022, but Wesley Morris has continued the project with new episodes dropping weekly on Thursdays, now featuring the Pulitzer Prize-winning critic in conversation with writers and artists about the cultural moment.

The current format centers on Wesley's interviews and reflections, and his voice as a critic is what holds the show together. He has a rare ability to connect a pop album or a courtroom drama to something larger about how Americans live and think right now. A recent episode saw him covering the Sean "Diddy" Combs trial, bringing firsthand courtroom observations into a broader discussion about celebrity, power, and accountability. Another found him working through his complicated feelings about Bruno Mars with culture writer Niela Orr.

Episodes run around 40 minutes and carry the production polish you'd expect from The New York Times. The tone is contemplative and unhurried, which makes it a different listening experience from the rapid-fire entertainment recap shows that dominate the charts. Still Processing isn't trying to tell you what to watch this weekend — it's trying to make sense of why the things we consume affect us the way they do. That makes it slower-paced than some competitors, but the payoff is a depth of cultural commentary that few entertainment podcasts attempt.

Pop Culture Crisis is a daily entertainment news show from Timcast Media, hosted by Brett Dasovic and Mary Morgan. The podcast positions itself as a counterpoint to mainstream entertainment coverage, offering commentary on Hollywood, celebrity culture, and the entertainment industry from a perspective that often pushes back against prevailing media narratives. Episodes drop almost every day and run around two hours, giving the hosts plenty of room to dig into multiple stories per sitting.

The show covers a broad range of topics — Grammy ratings, Disney corporate shake-ups, animated series releases, celebrity controversies, and box office performance all get regular attention. Brett and Mary take a conversational, opinion-driven approach, reacting to headlines and clips in real time rather than delivering scripted segments. The daily frequency means the show stays current, often covering stories the same day they break.

With over 730 episodes since its 2021 launch, Pop Culture Crisis has built a substantial archive. The show frequently features guest appearances that bring in additional perspectives, and the longer episode format allows for extended discussion that shorter shows have to skip. The production comes through Timcast Media's infrastructure and is straightforward — mostly studio conversation with occasional clips and visual references for the YouTube simulcast. For listeners who feel that mainstream entertainment media has become too homogeneous in its viewpoints, Pop Culture Crisis offers a daily alternative that covers the same stories from a different angle.