Meet Fio: the Catholic alternative to Spotify aiming to bring faith to your playlists
Fio is a Catholic audio streaming platform launched in 2023, now available in over 100 countries with more than 100,000 hours of content from 1,000+ creators. The service offers podcasts, music, and audiobooks, paying creators at least three to four times what Spotify pays per stream. Users can choose free, premium, or audiobooks+ tiers; free listeners hear ads curated for Catholic businesses, ministries and artists to protect against inappropriate content. Founders Will Hickl and Peter Buonincontro stress community, better discoverability and faith‑based advertising as key differentiators from mainstream services. Creators must submit content for review and confirm they practice Catholicism and accept Church teachings before being accepted.
3 months ago
Fio is a Catholic‑focused audio streaming platform that aims to give believers easy access to faith‑based podcasts, audiobooks, and music while offering creators better compensation and visibility than mainstream services. 1 2
Fio is available in more than 100 countries and hosts over 100,000 hours of Catholic content contributed by more than 1,000 faith‑aligned creators. 1 2
The service was launched in 2023 by Will Hickl—formerly a musician and founder of the Catholic label Novum Records—and Peter Buonincontro. Hickl spent 15 years in the music industry before recognizing that secular platforms did not serve Catholic creators well. 1 2
Fio pays creators a “penny per stream,” which Hickl says is three to four times the rate offered by Spotify, and limits the catalog to a few hundred artists to improve discoverability. 1 2
Listeners can choose a free tier (supported by ads), a premium tier, or an “Audiobooks +” tier. Advertisements are curated exclusively for Catholic businesses, ministries, and artists, providing a “cultural safeguard” for families. 1 2
Prospective creators must confirm they are practicing Catholics who accept Church teaching, attest that their work is not primarily AI‑generated, and undergo a manual review before content is approved. 1 2
Fio plans to add original productions, video podcasts, and music videos, and to incorporate “liturgical” features such as recommending content tied to feast days or saints. 1 2
The platform serves three main groups: Catholic creators seeking fair economics and exposure; listeners who want faith‑aligned audio without secular distractions; and Catholic businesses that lack effective religious‑targeted advertising on mainstream platforms. 1 2
Assess Catholic media platforms’ impact on faith formation
Catholic media platforms (Catholic press, radio/TV, websites, podcasts, and social-media apostolates) can be a powerful instrument of faith formation—especially when they help people not only receive information but also make true encounters with the Gospel and with real human persons. The Church’s teaching highlights both (1) the mission-critical value of Catholic communications and (2) the indispensable need for media education and moral discernment to secure authentic spiritual growth.
Catholic communications are not merely an optional “extra” to Church life; they belong to the Church’s mission. The Church teaches that social communications should be integrated into every pastoral plan because they contribute to “virtually every other apostolate, ministry, and program.”
This mission logic also applies to sustaining Catholic identity and moral formation—particularly in contexts where Catholics are a minority. For example, Catholic publications and news agencies can “offer continuing religious education and formation,” sustaining and nurturing Catholic identity and helping spread knowledge of Catholic moral principles.
Finally, contemporary social media is described as a real “environment” shaping identity and spiritual practice, especially for young people. The Church notes that the issue is no longer whether to engage, but how to be “loving neighbours” and genuinely present on the “digital highways.”
A key impact of Catholic media is continuity: not episodic catechesis only, but ongoing instruction. John Paul II explicitly links Catholic publications and news agencies to “continuing religious education and formation,” and even to the spreading of Catholic moral teaching.
Catholic media can help Catholics remain rooted in the Church’s moral vision, especially where cultural pressure is strong. In the minority context mentioned by John Paul II, these media can “sustain and nurture a sense of Catholic identity.”
Faith formation is not only receiving teachings; it is also learning to meet God and neighbor in a personal way. In the Church’s reflection on social media, the “Word of the Day” or “Gospel of the Day” is described as something many Christians search for, and the digital environment is said to offer “new and easier possibilities for a regular ‘meeting’ with the divine Word.”
Crucially, the same text warns against reducing the experience to screen-based information. It says the encounter shifts “from seeing information on the screen to encountering another person telling a story,” extending “hospitality” to the stories of others and beginning relationship-building.
Pope Francis insists that connections need to become encounters: it is “not enough to be passersby on the digital highways, simply ‘connected’; connections need to grow into true encounters.” He further emphasizes that Christian witness depends on personal engagement and that media must show “tenderness,” not only technical effectiveness.
This is an important criterion for assessment: Catholic media platforms form faith more deeply when they cultivate person-to-person openness—mercy, patience, listening—rather than only disseminating content.
The Church teaches that there should be a pastoral plan for communications and that communications should be “an integral part of every pastoral plan.”
Also, John Paul II encourages establishing communications structures (such as diocesan media offices where possible) and making “media education… an increasing part of the formation” of priests, seminarians, religious, catechists, lay professionals, and parish communities.
Pope Paul VI places the first steps of media education “within the Family,” teaching children to understand media, choose among programs, assess content, and dialogue with communicators.
He continues that this training should extend in schools, noting that Catholic schools have a specific obligation (citing Inter Mirifica) and that Catholic teachings and policies regarding media should be presented in catechetical manuals.
Parishes and local communities of believers are also asked to help members choose, understand, and assess media—recommend or advise against programs and explain the reasons in continuity with the Gospel.
A European bishops’ statement emphasizes that the best and most lasting protection is giving children skills and understanding for critical interaction with media. Media education is described as fostering not only critical understanding, but also “critical participation as cultural producers.” It also calls media education “a lifelong process.”
John Paul II similarly connects media formation to critical evaluation, explicitly encouraging “media education, including the critical evaluation of media output.”
A Church document in Acta Apostolicae Sedis stresses that media education should be positive, helping children develop “appreciation, prudence and the skills of discernment” through exposure to “aesthetically and morally excellent” content.
It also frames media education in terms of freedom: education in the exercise of freedom is demanding, because freedom is often presented as a relentless search for novelty; authentic freedom is choosing “all that is good, true and beautiful.”
Catholic media can form well, but it can also be distorted by the dynamics of the digital environment. Pope Francis describes how media ecosystems can contribute to polarization and division, noting that people can “engage in meaningful discussion or unfair attacks.”
In his World Communications Day message (2014), he argues that the speed of information can exceed reflection and judgment, leading to less balanced expression. He also notes that people can barricade themselves behind sources that confirm their own wishes and ideas, and that digital connectivity can isolate people from neighbors.
There are also specific concerns regarding minors and the responsible limits of expression. Pope Francis emphasizes the “risks inherent in an unchecked development of technology,” calling for urgent translation of moral concerns into concrete initiatives.
Finally, the Church recognizes that digital spaces can be shaped by artificial intelligence and algorithmic asymmetries that dull critical thought and freedom. The Dicastery for Communication notes the need to rediscover human encounter as communication becomes increasingly influenced by AI.
And Pope Francis describes how algorithms extract data from digital traces and create asymmetry—“a select few know everything about us while we know nothing about them”—which can dull critical thought and the conscious exercise of freedom.
Putting the Church’s teaching together, Catholic media’s impact on faith formation is best assessed by these principles:
In other words: Catholic media forms faith most effectively when it functions as an instrument of evangelization within a broader educational and pastoral ecosystem—one that trains people to encounter Christ, interpret media wisely, and live freedom responsibly.
Catholic media platforms can significantly impact faith formation by providing continuing religious education, sustaining Catholic identity, and enabling real encounter with Scripture and with others. However, the Church also insists that authentic growth requires pastoral integration and media education—especially the critical, lifelong formation that helps people choose the good, true, and beautiful while resisting polarization, isolation, and harms that digital life can intensify.