The best podcasts can make us laugh, gasp, and feel a little less lonely.
The Best Podcasts to Listen to Right Now
Even the best podcasts faced a challenge this past year: for millions of people, riding subways, catching buses, getting caught in traffic, and inching along in school pickup lines ceased to be a part of daily life. The primary podcast-listening hours simply slid out of existence.
And yet podcasts were so good and so desperately needed. We found time to listen to them on our thrilling trips to the grocery store, on our sad little midday walks around the block, and during the failures and triumphs of cooking more meals at home. Podcasts represented a blessed break from staring at screens, they brought intrigue and newness to our circumscribed quarantine worlds, and they helped drown out the voices in the back of our mind telling us to focus on being terrified. Podcasts were friends to us when we were cut off from our communities, isolated and lonely. They enchanted, educated, and entertained. If we gave into the ads and bought fancy mattresses, electric toothbrushes, and a dependence on high-tech underwear, well, who can blame us?
So here are the best podcasts that helped the staff at Glamour get through the past year.
O.C. Swingers
Each twist is more surprising than the next in this true-crime podcast from former Glamour editor Justine Harman (the same brilliant mind behind the addictive Broken Harts podcast). It follows the ongoing case against Newport Beach orthopedic surgeon (and former Bravo reality star) Grant Robicheaux and his girlfriend, substitute teacher Cerissa Riley, who are accused of drugging and raping over 1,000 women. —Anna Moeslein, senior editor
Gloss Angeles
I’ve listened to just about every beauty podcast there is, but my favorite at the moment is Gloss Angeles. It stars two former beauty editors, Kirbie Johnson (who worked at PopSugar for roughly a decade) and Sara Tan (formerly of Bustle). The two live in L.A., hence the name, and have such a fun, no-B.S. approach to beauty, since at their core they’re journalists and they know how to cut through marketing and internet fanfare. Segments usually start off with the biggest beauty news of the week and end with my fave, What's On Your Face?," in which they talk about the stuff they’re actually using and loving. If you’re into beauty, trust me. Download it. —Lindsay Schallon, senior beauty editor
Just Women’s Sports
World Cup champion Kelley O’Hara is a very cool person, so it should come as a shock to no one that she could create a very cool podcast about women in sports. She’s talked to some of the most fascinating women in the game—Allyson Felix, Stephanie Gilmore, Chloe Kim, Carly Lloyd, Candace Parker—about equal pay, ambition, advocacy, and (duh) sports. Very worth a listen for anyone into women doing cool things. —Macaela Mackenzie, senior health editor
What I Wore When
Yeah, yeah, we're biased, but don’t you want to know what Natasha Bedingfield wore when she wrote “Unwritten”? What about what Jameela Jamil wore to her first day on The Good Place? Don’t you want to hear La La Anthony analyze literally any outfit she’s ever worn? What I Wore When, hosted by Glamour’s own Perrie Samotin, asks powerful, fascinating women to talk about the outfit they wore on a day their life changed forever, and dives deep into how fashion, taste, and self-presentation help define and reveal us. —Jenny Singer, staff writer
Going Through It With Tracy Clayton
Tracy’s laughter is the cherry on top of a feel-good podcast that features different women of color sharing their stories on how they realized their calling (and what was getting in the way) while taking back control of their career, happiness, and sense of community. —Michella Ore, editorial assistant
Code Switch
NPR’s Code Switch is an informative podcast about how racism seeps into social norms and the workplace. If you’ve ever heard the term microaggression and wanted learn to more about what it means, listen to this and learn how bias occurs even when it’s thinly veiled. —Christopher Rosa, entertainment editor
Bitch Sesh
Bitch Sesh, a podcast about the Real Housewives and other musings, from Casey Wilson and Danielle Schneider, was a big source of comedy comfort for me this year…especially one that included the divine launch of a new franchise on Bravo: The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City. —A.M.
StraightioLab
Get it? It's a play on RadioLab!
Calling all glamour girrrrrls. This very funny absurdist hour with Brooklyn comedians Sam Taggart and George Civeris asks: What is straightness? (Neither host identifies as straight.) Is it hats? Is it Carhartt jackets? Prom? What about the city of Denver—is that straight? In a series of segments with guest comedians, they unpack these topics with the painful self-awareness of people who are both cooler and more depressed than you.
Accused of creating a podcast that is too heavy on irony and comedic bits, Civeris said in a recent episode, “This is my attempt at being earnest: I am unhappy.” To which Taggart added, “And I am in a bad mood.” StraightioLab will certainly cheer you up, and will possibly have you questioning your sexuality. —J.S.
Naked Beauty
I started listening to Naked Beauty after following Brooke Devard on Instagram for a while, and it was the best choice. Brooke has the greatest guests on the show, and in my opinion she’s always ahead of the curve. She also gives a lot of young black women a chance to speak about their passions and favorite beauty products. I just walk away with a smile on my face after each episode.—Khaliha Hawkins, producer
Still Processing
Listening to Wesley Morris and Jenna Wortham is chicken soup for the soul. The two New York Times culture geniuses talk about entertainment, politics, race, and generally what it means to be a human in this weird world. —Shanna Shipin, commerce editor
What Next
If you still have questions about the uprising happening across the country in 2020, turn to this episode of the What Next podcast by Slate. It offers an overview of similar situations that have happened in history, and explains why protests were effective. —C.R.
It’s Been a Minute With Sam Sanders
After spending the greater part of the year listening to podcasts, the prerecordings of people in conversation can start to lose that intimacy that made them so appealing in the first place. They can feel stale. It’s Been a Minute is a breath of fresh air. Sanders’s thoughtful approach to sensitive topics—including finding hope amid the loss brought on by COVID as well as Asian American identity—not only inspires me with each listen, it reminds me of what it feels like to be human. —M.O.
More Than One Thing
On More Than One Thing, Athena Calderone gets incredibly successful people talking about how their lives are actually imperfect, and that makes them all the more interesting. Calderone’s voice is so soothing, the creatives she interviews are so inspiring, and her questions are so thoughtful. More Than One Thing is one of the few podcasts I listened to this year that actually made me feel better about myself and the crazy state of the world. —Talia Abbas, commerce writer
The Read
Obviously 2020 was all over the place, but Kid Fury and Crissle were a reliable piece of that roller-coaster year. Listening to them is like spilling tea with friends. They touch on petty pop culture while recognizing that it’s the least of our worries, answer reader questions with honesty and insight, and read public figures for filth where necessary. I was a little late to the game with this podcast, but I’m holding on for dear life from here on out! —Erin Parker, commerce writer
The Science of Beauty
For someone who spends an obsessive amount of time looking at any new development on my face—Is that a new pore? Was that dry patch always there or is it the new toner/moisturizer combo I started using?—this podcast is like heaven. Filled with expert opinion and background research on favorite products, from acids to Botox, The Science of Beauty is like my late-night Google scroll come to life. —M.O.
This story originally appeared on: Glamour - Author:Jenny Singer
