On December 5th 2019, we released our first ever episode of English Learning for Curious Minds. 

It was listened to precisely 100 times, then…crickets (=”no reply or reaction at all”), or at least not for a while.

Fast forward exactly 4 years, and we haven’t stopped:

• 400+ episodes created
• 5 million downloads
• Listeners from every country in the world (even the Vatican City…)
• Members from 98 countries

2023 has been a great year, and here are some of the main things we’ve achieved:

• The podcast was listened to 2,595,963 times for a total of 605,724 hours
• We launched a new fictional podcast in collaboration with some amazing English language podcasters (Pioneers Of The Continuum)
• We launched our first story-based course (The Mules) and a special secret murder mystery course...
• We launched study packs, allowing members to go deeper with every episode
• We ran several new challenges (Vocabulary Builder Challenge, British English Challenge, Phrasal Verb Challenge)
• We introduced a new AI-powered tutor to our community challenges (called Da Vinci, obviously)
• We launched instant translations in 12 languages (actually it’s 14 now…)

For those of you who like statistics, here were our most popular episodes of the year:

1. #344 | Adolf Hitler | Der Führer
2. #372 | The War on Milk
3. #332 | The Bizarre Life of Lewis Carroll
4. #356 | The Ku Klux Klan: A History of Hate
5. #394 | What Is Hell?
6. #376 | Porn & Big Money
7. #338 | The Tragic Life of Anne Boleyn
8. #384 | Napoleon Bonaparte
9. #412 | A Short History of Mental Health
10. #364 | Do Idioms Really Matter?

And here are the most popular countries for the podcast

1. Spain 🇪🇸
2. Germany 🇩🇪
3. Brazil 🇧🇷
4. Turkey 🇹🇷
5. Poland 🇵🇱
6. Iran 🇮🇷
7. Italy 🇮🇹
8. United States 🇺🇸
9. Mexico 🇲🇽
10. Russia 🇷🇺

Like maps? Here’s one that shows the different countries listeners are based in. The darker the blue, the more listeners there are (Hello Spain!).

Strangely enough, it seems like the show was slightly more popular with men than women last year:

And most of our listeners are in the 28-44 range:

And if you are in the mood for even more numbers, here are our most popular articles:

1. How to Find a Conversation Partner in English
2. What Is Comprehensible Input and Why Does It Matter for Language Learning?
3. Connected Speech In English: What It Is And How To Learn It
4. What is Shadowing And Why Should You Use It To Improve Your English Speaking Skills?
5. Intensive Listening vs. Extensive Listening in English
6. The Best Free Tools To Improve Your Writing In English
7. The Ultimate Guide To Improving Your English Listening: A Step-by-Step Guide + 9 Listening Activities
8. Input vs. Output—What Is the Right Mix for English Learners?
9. The Definitive Guide to British Regional Accents
10. My Favourite Episodes of English Learning for Curious Minds of 2022

We have some big plans for the coming year, and are actively working on these at the moment. 

If you have been following from Day 0, or you have only recently joined us on our journey, thank you. This wouldn’t be possible without you.

See you in 2024 ✌️

P.s. if you’re interested, you can read our “annual reports” (one and two).