Top 20 Data Science podcasts you should listen to

As Harvard Business Review predicted in 2012, data science is going to be “the sexiest job in the 21st century.” We all know anyway, HBR or not, that nerdy is the new sexy. In that age, data science podcasts are basically your guide to sexiness.

Data science is a field where you have to be constantly learning, and not just technical knowledge for that matter, but you also need to be up-to-date with the market’s trend.

Data science is a vast field with a plethora of subfields, and you need to know where your best opportunities are. Data science podcasts are perfect and probably the most practical way to keep up with the pace that the industry’s going by.

Here are the top 20 podcasts, each with its own particular area of focus, which can keep you on track.

1. SuperDataScience

The SuperDataScience podcast addresses people who are interested in the field in general, whether they are students, amateur practitioners, or long-time pros. Unlike probably all of the other podcasts on this list, even people who are outside the data science field altogether can learn a thing or two from listening to this one. That’s because Kirill Eremenko, the podcast’s host, is a lifestyle entrepreneur besides being a data science coach, and so he discusses topics like “Empathy and Compassion” or “The Trolley Problem,” which aren’t directly related to data science but are more like mind exercises. The purpose of this podcast is to introduce people to data science, keep them in pace with the field’s trends, while at the same time feeding them with the mindset that can help them maintain an edge as they proceed in the field; hence, the moral topics.

2. Data Skeptic

This data science podcast is purely technical, meaning that all of its episodes are interviews with experts in particular data science subfields, each of whom discusses a certain theory or concept in a raw technical sense. Describing it this way doesn’t really capture the light-hearted vibes that Kyle Polich and Linh Da Tran, the married co-hosts, add to the podcast, though. Also, you would think such technicalities would be discussed using a lot of academic jargon, but actually, Kyle and Linh use a disproportionate amount of farm analogies and examples related to their pet parrot, Yoshi.

Chris and Vidya, the co-hosts of the Partially Derivative podcast, are a couple of cool nerds with an equal balance of both qualities. The conversations between the two are always light-hearted and they break down complex data science-related concepts, both technical and abstract, into bits and pieces that the average listener can easily digest. They convey the pulse of the data science community, presenting the arguments posed by various sides on a certain issue, and then asking the questions that might occur to any data science newbie and providing answers. It’s a perfect way to stay up-to-date with the debates and topics that are currently dominating the data science field.

4. Becoming a Data Scientist

This podcast will present to you the journeys of people coming from all sorts of backgrounds who made their way into the field of data science. Renee launched the podcast primarily to tell her story in the field, then to give people the chance to tell theirs, and as you start in the field such stories can be an illuminating guide for you.P.S. The podcast hasn’t been putting out new episodes since March of last year, but it’s unclear if it has stopped or is just on a prolonged break. Anyhow, you should definitely check out the old ones.

5. Data Leaders

The Data Leaders Podcast is primarily concerned with discussing the potential of data science in the decision-making process for startups and small businesses. The host always refers to himself as “I” so we can’t be sure whether he’s talking in the first person or if he’s just too into data science. Anyhow, he mainly interviews the founders of startup companies, content creators, marketers, and financiers, and asks them how data science fits into each of their formulas.

Under some pretty intense episode titles like “Telling a Bot to Go Shove it” and “Stories of Degradation and Humiliation,” Joel Grus discusses everything related to data science. Joel has a background in simplifying data science-related knowledge, being the author of “Data Science from Scratch.” His interviews dig into technical concepts, applications, as well as philosophical discussions on data issues.

The podcast is focused on a very particular niche in the data science field; data storage. Storage Unpacked is hosted by Chris Mellor, Chris Evans, Martin Glassborow, and Gavin McLaughlin. In each episode, one or more of these hosts interview someone who specializes in a certain aspect of data storage and they run an extensive discussion of that subfield.

Data Camp is an educational platform fully dedicated to data science, and Data Framed is its official data science podcast. That being said, the podcast is focused on informing beginners in the field by exploring various data science applications, the problems being addressed by data scientists, and how each type of entity can stand to benefit from this budding field. It combines the simplicity that a beginner in the field can easily absorb with a practical view of data science’s role in solving real-life problems. 

Number of episodes: 17

Average episode duration: 1 hour 

This podcast hosted by the awesome duo Neil Lawrence and Katherine Gorman provides largely-academic discussions of AI and data science. They examine the limits of both fields and where they extend to exactly and discuss anything within those boundaries. It’s an enjoyable podcast, but if you’re just stepping into the field, you might keep it for later. You need to be somewhat familiar with the terminology to be able to keep up with their data rush.

This podcast takes you out of the nerdy side of data science and AI and into the dark realms of danger. It basically explores everything that we as humans need to beware of while developing in those fields lest we want to wake up one day to a new reality where we’re a subordinate species. You can learn from this podcast what the possibilities are and what turns data science and artificial intelligence can take in the future, and either be alerted by that knowledge or use it to destroy the planet. It’s your call.

The podcast basically draws the connection between Data Science, AI, and Big Data concepts, and the various products and services that we use on a daily basis that employ these concepts. That can get a bit technical (especially on the guests’ parts), but the podcast’s brilliant presenter Ben Lorica always manages to bridge the gap between the technicalities and their utilization in a way that most beginners can comprehend. Also, this podcast constantly explores virgin territories in terms of new applications and opportunities that remain untested (at least not widely).

Curtis Seare and Ginette Methot, the Data Crunch podcast co-hosts, both carry wide experience in the fields of data science and AI, Curtis as a data scientist and Ginette as a tech writer. Data Crunch is a subsidiary of Vault Analytics, a company concerned with the research and popularization of artificial intelligence concepts and applications, which actually gives Data Crunch an abundance of material to present. Sometimes that takes the conversation to politics, corruption, and brainwash (real cynical stuff), and in others, it’s about disaster recovery and patent laws.

13. Linear Digressions

If you get past Ben’s “weak sauce puns” (in Katie’s own words) you will find a lot of substance to absorb from this podcast. Defining the type of topics that this podcast presents would inevitably neglect a huge portion of its material. The co-hosts, Ben and Katie, talk about everything in the data science realm, from case studies and philosophical contemplations like “What makes a machine learning algorithm ‘superhuman’?” to career tips and purely educational episodes.

The Hub is basically IBM’s contribution to the data science awareness arena. Through interviews with some of the field’s experts (and that’s IBM, so you can bet they know the topmost of these), the podcast breaks down the major trends in a data science business application.

This podcast is a good window on the academic and business discussions taking place in the data science realm. Every episode, the podcast’s co-hosts Roger Peng and Hilary Parker either interview researchers and practitioners in analytics to get some insights out of them (no pun intended), or they themselves discuss a topic together.

16. Data Viz Today

Although it hasn’t been around for long, with only 8 episodes out since the podcast was launched last February, Alli Torban has already covered a fair deal of the essential topics related to data visualization. She’s definitely off to a good start. Every episode is an interview with a data visualization specialist, and the rowdiness typical to podcasts does not exist here. This podcast can be listened to in bed. How’s that for visualization?

17. The Cyentia Institute Podcast

Using purely data-driven research methods, the Cyentia Institute is an attempt by Wade Baker and Jay Jacobs, who are the founders of the institute and co-hosts of the podcast, to spread awareness and curate knowledge in the field of cybersecurity. Each episode is an interview with a data expert specialized in cybersecurity. The topics discussed in each episode vary within the bounds of that field, and that’s why you will find that the episodes are named after the guests and not the topics.

18. Data Stories

What this podcast practically does is explore what each group of people might see in the field of data science; what the stakes are for each professional, political, or social group. So, you’ll find episodes about data science from a feminist viewpoint, the links between data visualization and comic art, data ethics, etc. It’s partially philosophical, but each of these discussions will educate you on certain relevant concepts in data science.

19. Python Bytes

Every week this podcast examines some new applications, trends, or job insights that should concern any Python developer or someone who is getting started on Python. Since Python is a dominant tool in data science, you will always find things to walk away with from the interviews and talks that Michael Kennedy and Brian Okken run on this podcast.

A data science podcast’s name can’t get any more “Pythonesque” than that, really. This podcast is 100% dedicated to the discussion of Python methods, tools, and applications. For someone who is just starting out with Python, this might not be the best introductory podcast since you might find it a bit advanced. At some point, though, after establishing a basic understanding of Python, you will find this podcast’s material extremely insightful on the technical level.

With that list, you have all that you need to learn anywhere at any time. All you need to do is take out your phone, decide what aspect of data science you want to hear about at the moment, and just tune in. Learn about new concepts, listen to the stories of people who took their first steps into the data science field before you, and decide where you want to specialize.