LinkedIn audio allows members to record and share audio clips on their profiles. This feature provides a new way for professionals to express themselves and make connections on LinkedIn. However, LinkedIn audio is not yet available to all members globally.
What is LinkedIn audio?
LinkedIn audio, also known as LinkedIn Voice, allows members to record and post audio clips up to 20 minutes long directly on their LinkedIn profile. These audio posts appear in the new “audio” section on a member’s profile, underneath their name and photo.
Other members who visit someone’s profile can listen to the audio clips posted there. The goal is to enable professionals to convey their personality, share ideas, and make connections through the power of their voice.
How does LinkedIn audio work?
To post an audio clip on LinkedIn, members simply tap the “record audio” button from the LinkedIn mobile app. They can then record an audio clip by speaking into their phone’s microphone. Members can listen back to the recording and re-record it until they are satisfied.
Once the audio clip is ready to be posted, the member adds a short text caption and selects who can view the post (connections only or public). The audio clip then goes live on their profile for others to discover and listen to.
Examples of how LinkedIn audio can be used
- Sharing career advice and professional insights
- Telling stories and anecdotes from your work
- Introducing yourself and putting a voice to your profile
- Expressing your personality and interests
- Communicating passion for certain subjects and issues
- Previewing long-form audio content published elsewhere
In short, LinkedIn audio provides members a way to have meaningful conversations and form connections through the intimacy of voice.
Is LinkedIn audio available globally?
No, LinkedIn audio is not yet available to all LinkedIn members globally. As of October 2022, LinkedIn audio is only available in certain countries.
Here is an overview of the availability of LinkedIn audio as of October 2022:
Countries where audio is available | Countries where audio is unavailable |
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As you can see, LinkedIn audio has had a limited launch so far. It is only available in the U.S., Canada, Brazil, and India as of October 2022.
LinkedIn has said the goal is to eventually roll out audio across its entire global user base. But for now, the majority of members worldwide do not have access to LinkedIn audio yet.
When will LinkedIn audio be available globally?
LinkedIn has not provided an exact timeline for when they expect to launch audio globally. However, we can make some educated guesses based on their rollout strategy so far.
LinkedIn’s audio rollout strategy
When LinkedIn first launched audio in the U.S. in February 2022, they said their plan was to “slowly roll this out” to members. This suggests LinkedIn is taking a cautious, measured approach to expanding availability of this new feature.
So far, LinkedIn has focused the audio rollout on English-speaking countries where audio conversations may have the widest appeal. The U.S., Canada, and India are English-speaking countries that have large LinkedIn member bases.
Brazil offers a diverse Spanish and Portuguese-speaking user base for LinkedIn to test how audio performs in other languages.
Potential future audio rollout timeline
Based on LinkedIn’s cautious rollout so far focused on English-speaking countries, here is a prediction of how the availability of audio could expand globally:
- Late 2022: Audio rolls out to more English-speaking countries including the UK, Ireland, Australia, and New Zealand
- 2023: Audio expands to countries in Western Europe where English is widely spoken, like the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark
- 2023-2024: Audio rolls out to additional European countries and is translated into local languages, starting with French, German, Spanish
- 2024 onward: Audio continues rolling out gradually across Asia, Africa, Middle East, and Latin America with translations added
Again, this is just a prediction based on LinkedIn’s slow, English-focused audio rollout so far. The actual timeline may vary.
Why is LinkedIn audio not globally available yet?
There are a few potential reasons why LinkedIn may be taking a gradual approach to rolling out audio globally:
Assessing demand and usage
LinkedIn is likely using this initial soft launch phase to evaluate demand and product-market fit for audio before expanding it more widely. If they find good engagement in the initial countries, that will give them confidence to launch globally.
Working out moderation
Moderating audio content brings new challenges versus moderating text content. LinkedIn may want to assess how audio moderation goes in a smaller subset of countries before deploying it globally.
Localizing into other languages
Translating the LinkedIn audio interface and content into numerous languages is a major undertaking. LinkedIn may be buying themselves more time to localize audio properly before going global.
Managing increased storage/bandwidth
Audio files consume significantly more data and storage than text. LinkedIn may be scaling up their infrastructure gradually to handle the influx of audio content.
Conclusion
In summary, LinkedIn audio is an exciting new feature that brings the power of voice to professional networking. However, it is not yet available globally. LinkedIn has only launched it so far in the U.S., Canada, Brazil, and India.
LinkedIn seems to be taking a cautious, incremental approach focused on English-speaking countries first. It may be late 2022 or 2023 before audio rolls out more widely in Europe. And the full global launch may not happen until 2024 or beyond.
The pace of rollout is likely tied to assessing product-market fit, solving moderation challenges, translating to local languages, and scaling up infrastructure. But over time, the goal is make LinkedIn audio available to every member worldwide.