Best crypto podcasts in 2026

Akshay Datt

host of Founder Thesis, a long-form interview podcast with founders. He writes here about what separates the shows that last from the ones that stop at episode twelve.

Bankless, Unchained, Empire, The Chopping Block and The Defiant are the best crypto podcasts for most listeners, all publishing weekly or more often. For DeFi depth, add the un# podcast and 0xResearch. For cryptography and protocol engineering, Zero Knowledge and the a16z crypto show go deepest.

A crypto podcast is an interview or news show that covers digital assets, blockchain protocols and decentralized finance for an audience of investors, builders and operators.

Best crypto podcasts right now

Bankless

Bankless covers Ethereum and decentralized finance for people who want to understand where the system is going, not just where the price went.

The feed mixes guest interviews with a news roundup episode. Recent guests include Stani Kulechov of Aave, a lending protocol, and Mike Silagadze of EtherFi, a liquid staking platform.

Unchained

Unchained is the journalism end of the category. Laura Shin is a reporter, and the interviews are structured as questioning rather than promotion, which is why founders under pressure tend to show up here first.

One feed carries several formats: the main interviews, a macro segment called Bits + Bips, and The Chopping Block.

Empire

Empire runs founder interviews on Monday and a news roundup on Friday. Jason Yanowitz and Santiago Roel Santos have built it into the closest thing crypto has to a business-of-the-industry show.

Recent guests include Hayden Adams of Uniswap, a decentralized exchange, and Paul Frambot of Morpho, a lending protocol. Empire is published by Blockworks, a crypto media and research company.

The Chopping Block

The Chopping Block is four investors arguing about the week in crypto. Haseeb Qureshi and Tom Schmidt of Dragonfly, a crypto venture firm, join Tarun Chitra of Gauntlet, a risk modeling firm, and Robert Leshner of Superstate, a tokenized asset manager.

The value here is disagreement. Four people with real positions talk each other out of things on air. The show ships weekly inside the Unchained feed.

The Defiant

The Defiant covers DeFi specifically: protocol mechanics, governance fights and what is happening on-chain. Camila Russo hosts.

The format has shifted toward shorter news episodes of 10 to 30 minutes, with longer founder interviews mixed in. Recent episodes cover a proposal to cap Ethereum staking and the tokenization of US market infrastructure.

0xResearch

0xResearch is built for people who read the dashboards. It is the most analyst-shaped show in the category, working through token models, protocol revenue and market structure rather than narrative.

Boccaccio hosts with Blockworks analysts. Weekly, and dense.

the un# podcast

the un# podcast covers the institutional edge of DeFi: tokenization, stablecoin rails and how large allocators are moving on-chain. Sri Misra, founder of aarna protocol, a DeFi asset management protocol, hosts. He previously built and sold a consumer foods company.

Episodes run around 50 minutes. Guests have included Steven Goldfeder, co-founder of Arbitrum, an Ethereum layer-2 network, Nikhil Chandhok, chief product and technology officer at Circle, the stablecoin issuer, Ronit Ghose of Citi, and Jake Brukhman of CoinFund, a crypto investment firm.

It is a young show against Unchained and Bankless, and the catalogue is thinner. The guest list is the reason to subscribe.

Disclosure: the un# podcast is produced by Unnati, the studio that publishes this blog.

a16z crypto show

The a16z crypto show, previously called web3 with a16z crypto, covers the computer science under the industry. Robert Hackett and Sonal Chokshi host.

Recent episodes run a history of cryptography with the people who invented it, including Shafi Goldwasser on zero-knowledge proofs and Ron Rivest on RSA. The show is the crypto arm of the venture firm Andreessen Horowitz.

Zero Knowledge

Zero Knowledge is the deepest technical show in the category. Anna Rose interviews cryptographers and protocol researchers about proof systems, consensus design and privacy technology.

Recent topics include private information retrieval and post-quantum cryptography. Listeners without an engineering background will find it hard going.

Epicenter

Epicenter is the longest-running show in crypto, publishing since 2014. It predates most of what the rest of the category covers.

The interviews are long, technical and unhurried. Recent guests include Vitalik Buterin and Jason Yanowitz of Blockworks. Publishing has been irregular, with gaps of several weeks between episodes.

Coin Stories

Coin Stories is a Bitcoin and monetary macro show, hosted by the journalist Natalie Brunell.

The feed mixes hour-long interviews with short News Block episodes of under 10 minutes. Recent episodes cover Bitcoin treasury companies and a contested protocol upgrade. Little DeFi coverage.

Best crypto podcast for DeFi

The Defiant and the un# podcast are the two crypto podcasts built around DeFi rather than crypto generally. The Defiant covers protocol mechanics and governance. the un# podcast covers the institutional side: tokenization, stablecoins and on-chain asset management.

Bankless covers DeFi within a broader Ethereum frame, and 0xResearch covers it as an analyst would, through token models and protocol revenue.

Best crypto podcasts for beginners

Bankless and Unchained are the two starting points for beginners. Bankless explains how the system works and assumes no prior knowledge in its explainer episodes. Unchained gives the news with enough context to follow it.

Coin Stories works for anyone approaching crypto through the monetary and macro argument rather than the technology.

Zero Knowledge, 0xResearch and Epicenter assume real technical fluency and are the wrong place to start.

Most technical crypto podcasts

Zero Knowledge, the a16z crypto show and Epicenter are the three most technical crypto podcasts still publishing. Zero Knowledge covers proof systems and applied cryptography. The a16z crypto show runs long-form conversations with academic computer scientists.

Epicenter has interviewed protocol engineers since 2014 and treats the technology as the subject rather than the backdrop.

0xResearch sits one level below these: quantitative rather than cryptographic, aimed at analysts modelling protocols.

Which crypto podcasts have ended?

• Bell Curve, from Blockworks, published its final episode on 14 July 2026.
• The Scoop, from The Block, a crypto news outlet, ran a series finale on 18 July 2025.
• What Bitcoin Did is now The Peter McCormack Show. The feed continues at high volume, and the subject matter has widened to politics, macro and AI, with Bitcoin as one thread among several.

How to check if a podcast is active

Open the show in any podcast directory and read the date on the top episode. If nothing has shipped in 90 days, treat the show as dormant.

Two further checks:

1. Look at the gap between the last three episodes, not just the newest one. A show that went weekly to monthly is winding down.
2. Check whether the host changed. The Breakdown, Blockworks’ daily show, is now hosted by David Canellis rather than its founding host.

What makes a crypto podcast last?

Crypto podcasts that last commit to one seam and hold it. Zero Knowledge covers cryptography. Coin Stories covers Bitcoin and money. 0xResearch covers protocol analysis. None of them widened their remit to chase a bigger audience.

Cadence beats production value. Unchained ships near daily and Bankless several times a week, which is why both stayed relevant across two market cycles. Shows that publish when convenient stop publishing.

The host’s position in the industry does the work that promotion cannot. The Chopping Block hosts are investors with live positions. Sri Misra runs a DeFi protocol. Guests take the call because of who is asking, not because of the show’s download numbers.

Guest quality compounds faster than episode count. the un# podcast booked Circle, Arbitrum and Citi on a catalogue a fraction the size of Unchained’s.

Frequently asked questions