Podcasting is a form of cultural production and creative labour practice that involves producing, distributing, and consuming on-demand spoken and narrative audio via the internet. Media scholars, podcasters, and listeners credit authenticity as a source of trust and a driver of popularity for podcasts. Authenticity is a central organising principle in podcasting, shaping creative work, audience trust, and cultural value while also exposing creators to structural and affective vulnerabilities. Thus, this project uses authenticity as an explanatory lens to analyse podcasting practices. This study critically examines the extent to which podcasters’ practices are informed by notions of authenticities, how these claims of authenticities are shaped by broader contextual factors, including genre, production modes, and degrees of autonomy, and the effects and limitations for podcasters when their practices are perceived as inauthentic. Podcasting has grown in Ireland, yet attention to podcasters’ production practices remains underexplored. The Irish context is relevant for studying audio podcasting because it has among the highest levels of podcast consumption, so examining its podcasters can help clarify what makes podcasting successful. The study employs an interpretive qualitative methodology and collects empirical data through in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 30 podcasters from a diverse range of genres (e.g., narrative non-fiction, conversational, and fiction) and working models (i.e., independent, commercial, and public service) in the Republic of Ireland. The empirical findings demonstrate that authenticities are contextual, performative, and shared practices shaped by personal, relational, cultural, genre, production, industrial, structural, professional, and working model contexts. This research makes theoretical contributions to podcast studies, cultural production, media authenticity, field theory, Irish media studies, parasocial theory, cultural labour, platformisation of culture, performance theory, and the political economy of media. Moreover, this project has practical significance for scholars, podcasters, industry stakeholders, and cultural policymakers. The present work supports future research in podcasting through broader comparative work and multi-method approaches. Keywords: authenticities, autonomy, competence, genre, Ireland, parasocial relationship, platformisation, podcasting, political economy of media, production, working model