Philly Podcasts Make TIME Magazine’s 100 Best Podcasts of All Time List

A stack of TIME magazines. The magazine just released its list of the 100 best podcasts of all time, and Philadelphia podcasts made the list. (Getty Images)

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Philly Podcasts Including Fresh Air Make TIME Magazine’s “100 Best Podcasts of All Time” List

Because we here at Philly Mag love lists, we couldn’t help but notice that TIME magazine just published its list of the 100 Best Podcasts of All Time. And congratulations are in order for Philly’s own Terry Gross and her team at WHYY for making the best podcasts list for Fresh Air. The show started way back in 1975, long before anyone imagined that something called a podcast would exist. Gross took it national in 1985. Eventually, a podcast was born, because everybody and their grandmother were making podcasts. But here’s something I just learned today: Fresh Air was the most downloaded podcast on iTunes in 2016. That’s impressive!

Here’s part of what TIME had to say about Fresh Air in its justification for calling it one of the best podcasts of all time:

Yes, technically Fresh Air was (and still is) a Peabody Award-winning radio show—one of the most famous and beloved thanks to interviewer Terry Gross’ erudite approach to interrogating her famous subjects for the last 50 years. (As of 2023, Gross co-hosts the show with Tonya Mosley.) But nowadays it’s often consumed as a podcast and remains the gold standard of the tough interview genre, especially in a landscape where many podcasters stick to softball questions in order to guarantee high-profile guests. Nobody can match the rigor that the Fresh Air producers put into researching their subjects, nor Gross’ ability to observe and respond to her interviewees’ reactions in real time and ask the pointed question—all the more impressive given she’s often speaking to stars, writers, and politicians remotely from the WHYY studio in Philadelphia.

You can read the full writeup on Fresh Air here.

Some other Philly-connected shows on TIME‘s best podcasts of all time list also made the cut.

First up, it’s NPR’s Code Switch. That’s the popular podcast about race in America. And South Philly native Gene Demby is the co-host. (You can read my interview with Demby here. He rightly laments how Butterscotch Krimpets have changed.)

And you really can’t have a best podcasts of all time list or even a best podcasts of right now list without including Call Her Daddy. That’s the sex-talk show from Newtown native Alex Cooper. She earned something like $32 million last year. I definitely think I am in the wrong business.

The Brothers Kelce also appear on TIME‘s best podcasts list for New Heights. Winner Still Processing, the New York Times podcast about culture, is co-hosted by Girard College alum Wesley Morris. And Kelsey McKinney, co-host of Normal Gossip, lives right here in Queen Village. Her show is a hoot.

Speaking of Lists…

Best of Philly is on newsstands now. You remember newsstands right?! You should be able to find it at Whole Foods and Barnes & Noble locations as well as at many supermarkets in the region. If you’re papyrophobic, you can find the 200+ 2025 Best of Philly winners here.

And More Lists…

I’ve written more than once about all of the vanity license plates that PennDOT denies. And naturally, this list changes over time based on what is happening in the world. (Nobody is going to apply for FKOBAMA nowadays.) Axios just did a piece on the most recent list. And you can see the full list for yourself here. Some of it makes perfect sense, like I understand why PennDOT doesn’t want you driving around with FK-TRUMP plate, and, frankly, you’d probably get a nice dose of vandalism if you tried to sport that plate. And IEATASS is also an understandable rejection. But then there are just bizarre denials like GOVNA. Also, how much are we paying people to monitor all this?

By the Numbers

12: Number of people shot during a 16-hour span over the weekend in Philadelphia. Not the kind of news I like to share on a Monday, but it is what it is. Still, homicides and violent crimes are both down year-to-date compared to the same time period last year, and last year saw homicides plummet.

8/3/1943: Date that a B-25C bomber crashed in Burma during World War II. Remains from the crash were turned over to the United States in 1974. And some of those remains were just finally identified as 27-year-old Philadelphia pilot Henry Carlin. The military will bury Carlin’s remains at Arlington National Cemetery next year. Because he hasn’t waited long enough.

$0: Additional funding for SEPTA attached to a new SEPTA plan being floated by Republican lawmakers in Harrisburg. The plan is to increase SEPTA’s accountability to the state but there’s no cash to actually help the agency. It sounds like you better have a contingency plan ready. Major service cuts are expected across the region in the coming weeks unless the state comes up with some big money for SEPTA.

Local Talent

Will Abbott Elementary do a shoot at a live Eagles game? A 76ers game? That’s what fans of both Philly sports teams are wondering after show creator and Philly native Quinta Brusnon (read my interview with her here) recently teased that the next season of Abbott Elementary will, in fact, shoot at a live event and that “Philly sports fans will be happy.” Let the wild speculation begin. The show is expected to return for its fifth season in October.

And speaking of Black genius, Philly author Tre Johnson has a book out titled exactly that. Well, Black Genius: Essays On an American Legacy. On Tuesday at the Center City Barnes & Noble, he’ll be in conversation with fellow local great R. Eric Thomas. I hear tickets are going fast.