Signal Hill Insights, a Canadian audio-research firm, has published the second report from its Audio on the Move study, released on 7 October 2026. The report is mainly about listening in cars, but it also asked people how they feel about content made entirely by AI, and the answers were lopsided against it.
“The steep rise in fully AI-generated music and podcasts has sparked controversy in the audio industry, which is why we thought it important to understand how these products are perceived by Canadian consumers”
Matt Hird, Vice-President of Research, Signal Hill Insights, in the Podnews release · podnews.net ↗
The survey covered a nationally representative sample of 6,161 Canadians aged 12 and over, questioned in May and June 2026. For fully AI-generated music, 5% said they like it, 65% dislike it and 29% are neutral. AI-generated podcasts fared slightly worse, with 4% liking them, 68% disliking them and 28% neutral. The question stressed content created wholly by AI rather than material only edited or touched up with it. Roughly three in ten respondents had no strong view either way on either format.
Teenagers aged 12 to 17 were less negative, though about half still dislike AI music or podcasts, with 37% neutral on music and 42% on podcasts. Of the AI formats tested, the mildest dislike was for AI images or memes on social media, at 60%, five points below music, and a clear majority also disapproved of AI-written articles, blogs and news. Signal Hill's research vice-president said those who dislike AI audio outnumber those who like it by at least 13 to 1.
Signal Hill ties the result to a wider national mood, pointing to the Ipsos AI Monitor 2026, which put Canada last of 32 countries for excitement about AI products and first for nervousness about them. The in-car findings in the same report show AM/FM taking 46% of yesterday's listening time, music streaming 27% and YouTube music 11%. The study's first report had already found music on YouTube to be the second-largest share of ad-supported audio in Canada, which is the setting for these findings. Signal Hill says the AI results mirror that national wariness, and it describes support for fully synthetic audio as very thin.
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