Convopage
See the entire conversation
Thanks to everyone who helped us beta test version 7 for Android. We got so much great feedback and watched our little baby evolve and change in so many awesome ways.
Now it’s time for the baby to leave the nest. Version 7 is now available to all! ๐๐ค
Pocket Casts 7 for Android
Those who follow us closely will know that our big version 7 update was a long time in the making. It brought major features like being able to play without subscribing, Up Next syncing and even Listening History. Late last year we launched it on Android as an open beta.
blog.pocketcasts.com
408 replies and sub-replies as of Mar 07 2019
I literally download the beta today. Sigh. ๐๐
I'd say "It's never too late"...but I think in your case it was ๐
On the plus side if you stay opted in you'll get access to new releases before everyone else. We're already working on v7.0.1 :)
I stumbled across the beta after not understanding the up next sync. Oh well. That's what I get for putting off looking into the issue.
Thanks again for all of your team's hard work!
Espero que en próximas actualizaciones mejoren la integración con los RSS. No me gusta que algunos sean recortados a los últimos 20 audios.
Ese problema no lo tiene castbox porque ellos formatean el RSS e integran todo en su plataforma.
we don't ever limit shows to 20 episodes, or any other number. It's up to podcast authors how many shows they put into their feeds. There are many with 1000+ episodes that load fine in our app.
Mayormente ese problema lo causa @
ivoox que recorta el RSS pero este si se agrega en Castbox puede pasar del límite establecido. Más del 20 sin que se pierda el último más viejo como pasa en todos los demás clientes a excepción previamente mencionada de castbox.
Este problema me resulta más molesto en los podcasts musicales que sigo lo cual lamentablemente están en ivoox y por su recorte de RSS no puedo acceder a viejos audios en casi todos los clientes a excepción de castbox que si puedo, dependiendo desde el momento que se agrego...
Sí un podcasts tiene 30 audios y no está previamente agregado a castbox. Este RSS siendo de ivoox tomara los últimos 20 (11 al 30) lo cual seguirá con 31 en adelante y sin desaparecer el 11.
Esto en otros clientes siempre queda en 20 y perdiendo el último más viejo.
Espero que se entienda lo que explico.
can you send me a link from our app to that podcast so I can have a look? Sorry for the English but hopefully we can both Google Translate :)
I write it fast in my language to be able to express myself better. Being honest, your app is good and I paid for it but I have not used it for a long time because I did not meet my current needs.
Hi, how can I clear/delete my "Listened history" in "Profile".
you can do that from the web player, or if you don't use that there's an update coming to the mobile app that will also let you do it
Is it possible to get the previous Android version back? This new UI is so clunky and missing things that I've grown to love.
might be more helpful to tell us what you find clunky and what's missing. Hard for us to take action on generic terms like that. Be the change you want to see in the world ;)
I enjoyed the 3 window setup (notes, player, up next/playlist) setup. I enjoyed marking episodes as played and having them still visible without having to apply a filter to find episodes (referring to the archive feature) in case I wanted to go back and re-listen to a show.
Thankfully I've got a high capacity device so when I forget to manually delete all the episodes I've listened to since "delete when marked played" is apparently gone I'm not running low on space.
Now to delete an episode, I have to either find it in the list of downloaded, then hit the check mark on the left and confirm deletion or I can go into the profile, gear icon, storage & data use, manual cleanup, select played and confirm that. That's a lot of steps vs the old way
I also want to add that the widget is completely broken
I had to reboot a few times to get it to work.
The up next-list is now below the player, so you have to swipe up. The show notes are under the button on the bottom left.
okay. How about making the podcast queue back the way it was. The auto download feature the way it was. Wait, why not make the whole app back the way it was. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
Exactly. How about you tell us what you believe the improvements are? Because I don't see any. Visually it's difficult to view, the episodes open more slowly or not at all when tiles are clicked and finding what episodes I downloaded is more clicks away then before. Could go on.
I think you might be mis-understanding how some of the new features work. The app is set to delete downloads when you complete an episode (Settings -> Auto Archive -> Archive Played Episodes). If you want to manually archive, just swipe right -> left on a row.
That's just it though. I don't want to archive it. Just mark it as played and blammo.... it's fine. Leave it in the list so users don't have to dig for it in extra menus.
I'm sorry for being difficult. I really don't like to cause a fuss. I'm a creature of habit and comfort. I've been using this podcast app for over 5 years now (3/4/14 I bought the app) and the old design was very simple and easy. I just want that back... Please.
I'm not really sure what you mean by having to create a filter to see played episodes. On the podcast page just turn on 'Show Archived' if you want to see things you've previously played/archived.
the old design isn't coming back. I too am a creature of habit but I gave this new version a week and ended up loving it. Try it for a full week, if you hate it, then let me know.
I don't need it to come back, I'm simply asking for the previous app to reinstall it and never update the app. Can we do that?
Just downloaded and excited to try out the new features! Would it be possible to get a "fullscreen" option in the next build? The new design is *very* cramped and has noticably less "non-menu" space.
we could possibly collapse some things when you scroll, which would be another way of getting there. Which page is feeling cramped to you?
All of them feel more cramped than the old UI, but the "Podcasts" and "Filters" are worse than the others. Having the nav "tabs" on the bottom and the nav "bar" at the top combined with Android's notification and nav bars is just a lot. Fullscreen would remove the Android ones.
The other elements/lists seem to have larger margins and spacing... but that could just be a false positive because of the other things above.
cheers, good feedback.
I'm just using your great app, you all do the hard work. Cheers, and congrats on launching the update.
it's true, but feedback like this is invaluable when we're working on new versions so appreciate you providing it!
I've tried since after Christmas to ask you about ompl files. It seems no one know or cares to help out.
What did you want to know about OPML files? No expert but I have imported and exported….
Wow, I can't find anything! I hate this!
what are you looking for?
After like 15 minutes of messing around I can't find:
• the list view of recent episode releases with descriptions
• how to add downloaded episodes to my queue
• how to reorder my queue
aka the 3 most fundamental features of how I use this app beyond hitting play
Up Next is your queue. You can find it in the player view. And to add an episode to your queue, tap on the episode and tap "Up Next".
I guess you hit the filter button and then "New Releases". It took me way too long to find that as that triangle filter icon in everything else would just change a sort order. This is a VERY non-intutive interface.
I just ran to my roomates phone to set it not to update.
Literally everything about how I used the app is gone.
- Tap on the 'Filter' tab, you probably want "New Releases"
- Swipe from left to right over an episode to add it to Up Next
- To re-order your queue, just drag the episodes up and down by their handle in the player.
Some screenshots here:
Pocket Casts 7 for Android
Those who follow us closely will know that our big version 7 update was a long time in the making. It brought major features like being able to play without subscribing, Up Next syncing and even Listening History. Late last year we launched it on Android as an open beta.
blog.pocketcasts.com
I did eventually figure out the (imo poorly named) filter tab. I would have never figured that swipe to add to queue without asking, though. I've been using your app daily since like 2013 and completely change all of these ingrained behaviors with no warning was super jarring.
lol wait how do I delete a single episode?!
tap on the episode if it's downloaded and tap the downloaded icon on the left. Or to archive an episode, you can slide the episode to the left to reveal the archive button. Tap that.
It wasn't clear to me what archiving would do, and doing it the "old way" only gave me the option to archive them all. I get it now, but how about some redundancies for the legacy long pressers in the house?
that's a fair point. That said the previous way of doing it was just as hidden. It's something we're working towards being better at (explaining new features)
if you're done with an episode swipe right to left over it to archive it. The blog post I linked to earlier is a handy thing to read when you get some time, it explains this and more :)
Pocket Casts 7 for Android
Those who follow us closely will know that our big version 7 update was a long time in the making. It brought major features like being able to play without subscribing, Up Next syncing and even Listening History. Late last year we launched it on Android as an open beta.
blog.pocketcasts.com
see how you go after a few days. The idea at this stage is long press for bulk actions, swipe for single episode ones. You can also tap on an episode to see all the options in detail.
Wow that new Version is great. All is so streamlined and really much nicer to use ๐ now your Alexa skill has to come to Germany and i am "wunschlos glücklich"
thanks, and agreed it would be good to expand our Alexa skill into more regions!
How do I sort episodes new to old vs old to new within the podcast? I also miss being able to see from the main screen which casts have new eps.
there's a menu option on the podcasts page which has a sort option in it. See screenshot: d.pr/i/MVN4UF
There's a similar button on the podcast grid where you can choose to turn on unplayed badges.
tempFileForShare_20190306-153539.jpg
Shared with Droplr
d.pr
Thanks! I wouldn't have guessed those were called Badges. FYI, it took a while for them to show up after I turned them on.
can you try opening the Google Home app, then coming back to Pocket Casts. Does it appear then?
It doesn't, I see the same thing.
the widget works for me no problem - maybe try removing it from the home screen and re-adding it?
a few people have said that they either had to re-add the widget or reboot their phones to get it to appear. Not 100% sure why yet, but that has fixed it in each case.
Loved the released version, my best wishes to the team you're the best in the game ๐♥๏ธ
thanks!
Great new UI! This app is a shiny example of paid apps done right with continued support.
Side note, is there an option to archive after the episode is finished?
thanks! And yes there is! Settings -> Auto Archive -> Archive Played. I think by default it's actually set to do that.
Sweet thanks! How does the desktop/web player handle this?
we were waiting til the Android version launched to update this, but it will archive them as well
You da best!
Small suggestion: please improve the animations. A major area with no animations is the settings view. Please try and add (at least) a slide animation when tapping on option categories. Also, the podcast view expand animation is a bit rough compared to iOS and isn't as smooth.
good suggestion, thanks
Overall though version 7 is amazing. Keep up the great work :)
Can you please add settings per podcast back so that I can change the speed of only a few podcasts not all?
that's still there. If you're in the settings for that podcast tap "Playback Effects" and set them to what you want for that podcast. Later if you change them in the player while that podcast is playing, they will be remembered.
Thank you, you can see how this could be confusing after there was a button for "only this podcast" in the quick settings before
I have some podcast that I do not necessarely listen in the release order. It used to sort downloaded casts first and as soon as I listened, it deleted the cast and the unlistened/downloaded casts went on top. Now it is in cronological order, even if I have listened to a cast
Also what does archive means?
Archiving is the new way of saying "I don't want to see this episode for now". If you want a quick way to transition use this button and choose to "Archive all played":
tempFileForShare_20190306-153539.jpg
Shared with Droplr
d.pr
you need to give us the option to bring downloaded podcasts to the top of the pile, like in the older versions. I'm working my way through some old episodes, in a podcast with 300+ episodes; scrolling to the bottom going to be incredibly arduous.
Agreed, there are podcasts on my list with HUNDREDS of old episodes I've yet to listen to and which don't go in any particular order. No way I'm going to go through and archive 200+ of them so it's easier to find ones I've downloaded.
Right now the best way to find them is to go to the "downloaded" filter and scroll all the way to the bottom, but that's still a pain when I used to be able to just go to that feed and immediately see all the episodes I had ready to go.
Absolutely. Burying downloaded at the bottom of a show's feed makes zero sense and makes the whole app extremely difficult to browse. It's like they paid attention to a single use case and ignored everything else.
I miss this feature, as well.
you're welcome!
Only thing I'm still having issues with is auto download. In the past I would uncheck "wifi only" so cellular data could download episodes but now I have to open the app to initiate downloads. It used to download anyway in the back ground.
it should still do that, though you might want to check Settings -> Auto Download and make sure "Only on unmetered WiFi" is turned off?
The new design is nice but very jarring. Some sort of on-screen walkthrough would be very helpful. Also, I lost everything in my next-up with like 52 podcasts in the queue. I may be an outlier, but I tend to add lots of episodes at once and let them all play over a few days.
agreed, we'd like to get better at walking people through new features and explaining them. It's been a weakness of ours for a while now.
How about a Pocket Casts podcast? It might be really neat to get a 5-10 min snippet of what's going on, new features, etc. Could be the default podcast subscription for new installs. ๐คทโ๏ธ Keep up the great work! IMO, PC is the best podcast for listening/managing podcasts by far.
Yes! I’ve missed Russells warm soothing voice from the days of Material.
They would have to let the techies out of the dark cellar they have been locked into. The new app design is obviously a cry for help.
You knew it was a weakness, but you did it (badly) anyway.
Too bad you dont use Playlists. They would be ideal for someone like you. Oh wait.... They just removed that feature too. At least Up Next allows you to reorder podcasts. Unlike Filters which is Only new > last or vice versa.
ha, I think the Castro guys do that, or at least used to. It's an interesting idea though making a podcast is a lot of work!
Is the new redesign a result of the NPR acquisition? The sort of over the top baby-with-the-bathwater non sequitor redesign doesn't really seem like your style. Plus, almost exactly one year to the day since the acquisition... Timing is, uh, suspicious.
Pocket Casts acquired by NPR, other public radio stations, and This American Life
One of the best podcast apps just got bought by some of the biggest podcast producers
theverge.com
it's a fascinating narrative, but sadly not grounded in reality. It's just the Android app catching up to version 7 on iOS, which we rolled out last year. NPR has no authority or say over our development which remains on the other side of the planet to them.
So now it's time for proper (standalone) app for @WearOSbyGoogle! ๐
I think if you asked our main Android engineer the answer would be "most definitely!". That said there's a little bit of confusion about WearOS is headed, so we're waiting to see what Google do with it at Google I/O 2019
So fingers crossed and I hope for best! Your app is the last thing I need to be able to run without my phone ๐
pun intended?
Noooooooooooo
Yesssssssssssssssssss
Is there an opportunity to roll back? The beta cut my usage in half, I don't want that to happen again :(
I don't know why you're being so arrogant & stubborn when interacting with your users. We're not married to your app & we'll find something better. It's just sad seeing THE perfect podcasts app forgetting what made it perfect & ignore the cries of its users.
If we are married to the app we can always try a divorce.
That was my first reaction. Sooo arrogant and detached from their user base. Just unbelievable.
By the way, I'm filling the papers for divorce, Podcast Republic seems to be better. It'll take some time to organize this, but I don't want these surprises anymore.
Podcast Republic eh? Sounds like a democracy ๐ I'll check it out
It is simple horrible and it's irresponsible to do these abrupt changes form a day to another.
The app is not playing when my phone locks now. Keeps switching off after a couple of mins. Are the custom playlists gone now
sounds odd, might pay to check it's not your phone trying to turn on battery saving for it or something like that?
Thanks for your reply. I restarted my phone and it's perfect. Just wondering are the custom playlists gone. I loved having music podcasts in one playlist and interviews in another list
Felt lost this morning without them. I will try for a while without them and see how I get on.
in reworking the app we found some features that conflicted with other ones, and had to decide which ones to keep and which ones to remove in order to make the app simpler and better. Sadly because it wasn't widely used, the multiple playlist feature didn't ma...
Just updated, first impression is what the F**K did you do. So you've started off bad. I can't even work out how to select multiple podcasts. I subscribe to feeds where I don't want to listen to every podcast. I long press on one and then select all I don't want, then delete.
How do I just delete an episode I don't want to download. Also that for the same. I get 300-400 episodes a day.I want to 1) select multiple podcasts and delete without downloading.2) delete industrial episode without downloading. I swipe one way and can archive, the other up next
Reading a blog I think I understand the archiving. But HOW do I select MULTIPLE episodes at once. Previously you just long pressed on it. You can't do that now. This makes the app useless and unusable for me if there's no way or detecting multiple episodes.
archiving is what you want, with the swipe you've already found. You can also configure a podcast to only keep the 1 (or 2, or 3) most recent episodes if you want it to automatically clean things up for you. Check the settings for that podcast (under Auto Archive)
That's no use I have one feed that does around 100 episodes a day I go through and pick what I listen to. The easy way I used to use was multi select the ones I didn't want and archive before downloading and only download what I wanted. I can't do that now.
so you used to have to tap each episode you didnt want, and now you have to swipe each episode you dont want. doesn't seem like a downgrade...or am I not understanding?
In the time and action of swiping my finger all the way across the screen which I could have done previously, I can tap about 5 episodes using multi select. It's a massive downgrade. Takes way longer and the action is extremely laborious.
can't you swipe the ones away you don't want? Right -> left swipe, gone?
I can but in the time it takes to swipe my dinner 5 across the screen fully to swipe away once episode I could have multi selected about five to do a bulk delete. radionz.co.nz/podcasts/allrn… is one feed I listen to. I pick episodes I want to listen to from throughout the day.
Multi select made this process easy, now I can't do that. They do have individual feeds to, bit of come to the same problem, I would also miss one off podcasts I don't know about by not subscribing to main feed. I usually end up listening to those.
Just looking at Google Play reviews they are pretty scathing. In a quick read there's a couple talking about the loss of multi select. Another user was selecting episodes to make a playlist.
Enjoying it so far. Gonna have to get my head around the best way to keep things organised with archiving etc, but seems helpful in the long run!
Any plans for more Google Assistant integration?
we'd love to, but are waiting on Google to add the APIs we need to make that happen. Currently you can't resume a podcast from a particular spot, or save where you got up to. Once they add that though we'll definitely consider it!
agreed. Would be great if it did but that's a proprietary Apple format we haven't found the time to reverse-engineer yet. Also most authors seem to be adopting the more open MP3 chapters so we'd encourage everyone to use those.
Is there a new beta for iOS?
Looks good, is "Sort by duration" soon? This would be a game changer for people like me, who'd like to listen to complete episodes per activity, commute etc...
Not loving the new interface. All of the little number icons showing how many unplayed episodes i have in each podcast have disappeared. I don't want to have to open each one to see if there is a new episode waiting. Please help.
Also, the option to long press and "add to up next" is gone. This is the feature I probably used most often. Why would you take away key features that worked well? Since this is a paid app, some consultation with customers would have been nice!
AND, episodes are now sorted by date even if some are unplayed. It used to just have unplayed episodes at the top of the list. I don't want to scroll endlessly to find unplayed episodes. WHY ARE YOU BREAKING FUNCTIONALITY? I paid for this app and now i hate it.
I feel you. Same here. Features are gone, dark mode menu-crampled UI is terrible, videos are not playing directly, only audio, you have to click on podcast icon, then you turn your phone and the video is hidden under another menu. Come on.
That's not the same thing though. Sometimes i still want to see the list of played (or old) episodes without extra taps!
This a hundred times! Thank you for describing this function so well, Luna, I was having a bear of a time trying to find the words. Maybe the way we use the app isn't they way everyone uses it, but removing what to me is one of PC's core functions seems utterly baffling.
I got them back by going to the menu button in the top right, picking "badges" and setting it to "all unfinished". Then had to close and reopen the app for them to show up.
Thanks, that did work!
What? Why? Thank you, no. Ugh.. I hate change. Gimme a few days to come around. Won't have time to play around with it while I'm on this work trip.
Mostly I think it's weird to have to go into my profile to see a list of downloaded episodes. I really want it to be in with the filters.
Looks great, but I wish it had asked us if we wanted to download the 60-odd podcast episodes in the Up Next queue rather than just doing it.
The new UI literally added an additional tap to nearly all my interactions with the software. Want to go to newest releases? Now it's an additional tap through "Filters". Add to Up Next? Now i have to decide is "Play Next" or "Play last". And WTF is archiving meant for?!
And Play Next seems to silently ignore episodes that have already been marked as played. I kept silent when the iOS version ruined the experience on my iPad, because I thought, this was an Apple HIGs thing,but now I'll probably have to switch podcatcher :(
I agree. Good UI gets out of the way, instead of adding layers of complexity. The simple clean UI that I had on windows phone was perfect.
Is there a way to get back the numbers on the home screen telling me how many unplayed episodes?
Podcasts tab > three-dot menu > Badges
Thanks for the tip! It does appear that if you are using the 4-wide layout and then follow these directions to put the "All unfinished" badges option into effect, you may need to switch the layout to see the numbers. Can then switch back to 4-wide and then they are there.
Any chance you'll bring back the "Mark all as played" button? Because seriously, for the first time in five blissful years, I'm actually trying out other podcast apps...
Okay, you got me there, latest V6 is still the best around, so I'll just keep using that one until you bring back a solution to mark multiple episodes as played at once. But please do bring it back...
You can do "archive all" instead, that's the new as mark played in v7. It removes them from that list, and filters, etc. You can also long press and do "Archive all from here" if you want to leave some at the top.
Thank you for your answer. But why can't I at least multiselect (or "Select all" ideally) and then choose whether I want to mark my selection as played or archive it? We can keep the archive feature without losing the ability to mark several episodes as played... Please?
Are individual podcasts searchable? If I subscribe to a podcast after someone told me about a particular episode from months ago but doesn't know that date just the title or topic, how would I find it?
Absolutely awesome!
And why do I see "popular in United Kingdom" why is that relevant to me? I live in Ireland.
you can change your region at the bottom of the Discover page
No more swiping ๐ญ
there's still swiping! Left to right to add things to your Queue and right to left to archive!
One more gripe with the new UI is that I can't tell how much time I have left in my current chapter.
My playlist was replaced by one over two months old after the update which is slightly frustrating, tho not unworkable. Also, does it still cast to chromecast? I got a CC yesterday and was so exited Pocketcast worked on it, but now I can't find the function anymore
Nevermind about the playlist thing, I found it back in my downloads. Also, the Pocketcast widget doesn't seem to work anymore
Well I'll nevermind it all cuz except the widget it all seems to work again now. App is looking good so far!!
Your androidsupport@pocketcasts.com email that is listed on Playstore bounces back as "does not exist". I've reported app for this. There was no way I could describe my disappointment in the UI in just a single tweet. Made common things hard, uncommon front and centre. WHY!!?!!
Yep, already found it the same way, thank you for the info regardless. Still, incorrect info is enough to have apps pulled, as far as Google Play Store is concerned.
Thank you for all your hard work in making the best podcast app out there! It's very appreciated ๐โค๏ธ
oh wow, love the new look/feel! One thing - it's not letting me click the create filter button - i can select colours/categories but then the confirm button is greyed out and unresponsive. Am on Android. Any ideas?
Is this worth a go Brittanz? I’m fed up with apple-y podcasts
Oh it's wonderful - I've bought it several times for various platforms
Sorry but this new version is very very ugly. I thought I'd somehow been reverted to a very old version of the app but I guess not. Also it's no longer showing on the home screen how many unplayed episodes I have of each subscription... I have to go into each to check. Terrible
Ok I see badges were for some reason disabled by default and you can turn them on, though I had to go out of the app and back in for the change in settings to take effect. Still, UI is horrible :(
The upper and lower bands in the app are too wide and useless.
This update freaked me out... I'm not thrilled with it so far. It's such a big change. It no longer shows number of unplayed episodes on my thumbs. Badges say "off" and won't turn on. Feels like extra taps for some functions too. ๐
Yeah the number of unplayed episodes on the thumbs is a big miss for me. Is there a way to switch this back on?
Ok so worked this out. On your podcast page hit the three dots in the top right corner, under badges you want all unplayed!
Thanks! I changed it to all unfinished, but I then had to quit and restart the app for then to show
thanks for the feedback. We’re aware of the issue and working on a fix for the next release.
I don't see a way to show unplayed and unfinished episodes at the top of the list for a podcast, I have to scroll past more recent archived ones now. ๐ Please tell me I'm just not seeing a setting...
tap the three-dot menu and toggle 'Show Archived' off so you'll only see unarchived episodes
Thanks for your reply (& your great app!), but I am confused about your answer here: his question was about "unplayed" episodes & your answer was about "archived" episodes....what am I not understanding? Thanks again!!
You can actually set up the extra dark theme for an all-black-experience, or what is your concern?
My concern is illogical design.I don’t like extra dark on my IPS display. It’s better for an amoled matrix.
Oh, now I get it.
Grey – Grey for "dark"
Black – Black for "extra dark"
Am I right?
But as I use an AMOLED screen, "extra dark" seemed an obvious choice for me, can't tell why they decided on that color patern for "dark".
How do I unarchive an episode without adding it to play next?
Crap! Just lost a ton of episodes I hadn't listened to yet. ๐ฅ Yes, I know it's up to the maker of the podcast to publish more than 10 episodes in the feed, but the app on my phone knew about these older episodes so I could stille download them. Now it seems the feed has been
refreshed from the publisher, and has not kept the info it knew about older episodes. Wish I had some warning about this before updating. ๐ช
My phone has automatically updated to the new version, is there a way to go back to the older version?
Big thanks for the new version, it's better than ever ! I hope for an upgrade of the page Discover to have a french selection on all the page, not only in section "Popular in France".
The upgrade experience was awful. Forget that my entire, 10-hour queue was deleted. Forget that the widget no longer works...
You just replaced the entire app with a brand new app with completely different UX for *every single behavior*, with no explanation for users.
I don't know if it's because of how different everything is, but nothing feels intuitive yet, so the result is that I feel *stupid* using it.
I'm sure the new PocketCasts is great, but this is not a good feeling.
What's with this behavior?
what do you mean "what's with this new behavior"? You're viewing the play queue, and swiping away an episode will remove it from the queue
But if you cancel your swipe, it highlights the item in gray for no reason. That's what I meant.
And why do items show a flash of the "other" color when you swipe them?
it's truly baffling
I love the new design, but the queue somehow got difficult to use.
Any suggestions?
But props to your team, good job!
all it takes to queue now is a left to right swipe! You can set what your default full swipe is under Profile > gear icon > Playback > Default Up Next Swipe
For what it's worth I don't see this in playback settings on Android. I see Default Row Action but nothing related to swipes
Me too.
This is a horrible upgrade!!! You have turned off swiping to see various screens/info... Now I have to press a BUTTON to navigate. This is not the 1990's!!!
The new UI is legit! Pocket Casts is sexy now
Absolutely horrid.
And what happened to the widget?
rebooting your phone should fix the issue with the widget
And you removed custom playlists? What the hell?
Awesome news. The beta was a great experience and very stable. I'm happy to be part of the beta team. Thank you for your great effort! Keep up the good work! #podcatcher #podcast
It looks nice but it feels like you've made many of the basics more fiddly. Things that took a single swipe now take multiple, or a swipe and a tap. I don't see the benefit of archiving at all, not sorting with all unheard first is infuriating.
Omg, can't even long press & delete individual episodes anymore :(
instead of a long press, it's just a right to left swipe and your episode will be removed from filters and the download file deleted
That archives the episode. I only want to delete the downloaded file.
Is there a way to unarchive all episodes of a podcast at once?
if you've archived all, you can press then three-dot menu and select 'Unarchive All'
What happened to playlists?
Great work, it is beautiful.
Has the option to sort a podcast's episodes alphabetically also been removed? So far 7.0 feels like more backwards steps than forwards...
we've made the decision to remove playlists.
in reworking the app we found some features that conflicted with other ones, and had to decide which ones to keep and which ones to remove in order to make the app simpler and better. Sadly because it wasn't widely used, the multiple playlist feature didn't make the cut
Great!
How do I get my playlists back?
How do I get 2X speed again?
Found it. So, I had to go in a podcast, select custom, then change to 2x and then remove custom for that podcast? Why isn't there a global setting somewhere? Did I miss it?
global settings are in the player - second icon in on the bottom row
Found it. Thanks. I had only found the playback effects in each podcast. Custom speed for different podcasts will be useful in some cases when I need to concentrate while listening to technical podcasts in a foreign language or to music podcasts.
Will once a podcast is played, be marked as played and archived if I have that setting on? I'm having a little hard time for a use case for archiving, because I generally listen all the way through to an episode.
Thanks for the great update. But I've lost access to my custom episode folder. Is this feature still supported and where can I find it?
Where is the list of downloaded episodes?
Profile > Downloaded. You can also create a filter for downloads, but filters will not show any downloaded episodes from shows you aren't subscribed to
Dark mode doesn't change navigation bar to dark on OnePlus devices running Oxygen OS. ๐ค Other apps supporting dark mode does change navbar too, so probably something Pocketcasts need to fix?
I lost my queue on the update. Not cool.
Where is the "cast to" button now? It was sooo useful to use with Google home
should still be there. Can you check if opening Google Home and returning to Pocket Casts makes it appear?
After several times of opening and closing shows it Re appeared
This looks like an iPhone app from 2009. Change it back.
This update is so horrible. I can't reorder filters, I can't multiselect and mark as played from a filter. What the hell does archive from here actually do? I used that by mistake and lost months of carefully curated lists. I would pay to rollback.
I would also gladly pay to rollback. And I know I'm not alone. Did we just discover a new marketing technique? ๐ค
Yep, if @pocketcasts would name their price to go back to V6, I would pay now.
Ahhh! What did you do! It's too early to figure this out, not even a help to tell me what the new icons do. Adding new podcasts to my queue was easy, and I could see what's up next, etc, now I have no idea what I'm doing.
Sorry, liking what I knew better, at least so far...
Killed my up next playlust
as any specific settings you maybe had for some podcasts like the archive options.. ๐
And how do you see how many episodes a podcast has that you haven't listened to yet?
Just because its prettier doesn't make it better. I've just tried to change as many setting as possible to be like it was before (unintuitive). Long press on an episode should allow to add to Up Next or delete it like previously
Man what have you done to this gorgeous app. It's plain boring black or white now and looks really bad
Released without such a basic design change that most modern apps have: White navbar for White theme. It shouldn't be black.
I guess I'm going to wait for the 7.5 redesign if it ever comes
Is there a way to reduce the size of the UI elements/fonts so I can fit as much on the screen as I could before?
I'm a paid user and after I updated today I just want to delete the app and cry. So many things are wrong with this version. Reminds me of 2017 Skype update
anything we can help you with?
Give me a tissue ๐ข
I guess I'll just go back to version 6 and pretend this never happened.
Where are all my playlists??
in reworking the app we found some features that conflicted with other ones, and had to decide which ones to keep and which ones to remove in order to make the app simpler and better. Sadly because it wasn't widely used, the multiple playlist feature didn't make the cut.
That was a key function for me and by the looks of it a number of others. Do you have plans to replace this function or do I need to find a new app?
hi, how do I force the download of a podcast via mobile data? It is "waiting for WiFi" and the down arrow icon has no effect. I already tried disabling auto-download to no avail, new episodes are stuck in a limbo requiring WiFi connectivity.
Found it, long press, stop download and restart manually. Lots of undiscoverable anti-patterns in this release.
This update is beautiful! Thank you for all your hard work. ๐ง
Loving it so far!
Much better to use when driving. ๐
Can we get an pref. to 'pause playback on device mute'? Please please.
Too frequently BT drops or the lock screen play activates, PC plays through the entire episode+ without me... ๐ฅ
Anyway to revert to the old version, I tried the beta and the UI was horribe, very disappointing to see the auto update. Even recommended pocketcast on our blog now it will be uninstalled when I finish this episode bit.ly/2tS6aaT
Where did my playlists go?
we've made the decision to remove playlists.
Fire your CPO.
This was a surprise this morning when I fired it up! I'm liking the new look. Congrats on the release guys! This is my favorite podcast app out there on multiple platforms.
I've been using the beta version for about a week maybe. Solid update. The playlists in sync is hands down the best new feature
Android's widget doesn't work any more
restart your phone, seems to fix that issue
Is there a way to sort episodes so that downloaded show first? I have a few that I'm behind on and all the newest undownloaded episodes are first.
Not a fan of this new look. Now it takes longer to add an episode to up next, find episodes since the sorting option is borked....please let me roll back...
Also, swipe to add to queue defaults to add next....I will never want to use add next....I want it added to the end so I have to swipe and press the add the end option (once I can figure out which icon means which) so it really saves no time vs hitting the icons.
I like the new UI, it looks great, but... why would you remove custom playlists...? It was a feature I used extensively every day. That's a significant step back.
I already went on a small rent in December when I briefly tried the beta which I don't want to do again but please add back the long press to multiselect. This will make the app at least usable and I really don't want to do the process of moving my subs to another app.
While I'm at it, please add the bring back the ability to autodelete a file after its played instead of autoarchiving. I don't want to hide any shows but I do want the file to be gone once I'm done and I don't think this is uncommon.
Normally I enjoy software updates, but this was a swing and a miss. I can't even see file download sizes anymore. Nothing is intuitive to use. You claim this was beta tested.... Really?
The new design is very ugly, less intuitive, and more difficult to quickly navigate. I'm dumbfounded by a radical redesign that "fixed" so many things that weren't broken.
The overall dark mode redesign is jarring to my eyes. The additional navbar at the bottom makes the playback controls more difficult to use. The inability to sort by downloaded first without archiving the whole feed has ruined navigating shows where I pick and choose episodes.
PocketCasts was far and away my favorite podcast app and one that I immediately recommended everyone buy. I would not recommend this new version to anyone and will be looking for personal alternatives unless some of these issues are addressed soon.
What does "draggable player" mean?
I've been on the beta for weeks, congrats on release! Although it was initially frustrating to lose my old Up Next queue, I really enjoy the new design.
Suggestion - I split screen this app with Maps, and the new UI doesn't play as nice with the 1/3 screen as it used to. cheers!
How do you find your playlists??? I cannot find my playlists anywhere
we've made the decision to remove playlists.
Wow...that really sucks. I think i may have to move to Google podcasts. Thanks for the reply
got any recommendations of a podcasts app that will allow me to make a playlist of episodes?
I had multiple playlists for separate subjects, now I can only see the next up queue. Are they there and I just can't find them? The multi select was also much easier for doing the order of the casts when adding to the queue or bulk ignoring episodes I didn't want to hear.
we've made the decision to remove playlists.
What happened to the red number badges that appeared on each podcast thumbnail to let users know they had new episodes?
Option to show badges is still there. Tap 3 vertical dots > Badges > make selection. Badges aren’t shown instantly & we’re aware of the issue and working on a fix for the next release. In the meantime, tap & change layout to make the badge show.
Thanks! Still a bit of a learning curve but I am warming up to the new updates
I was pretty used to long pressing and adding to queue. What's the best way to accomplish that now? looks great btw!
Really miss "unplayed" episodes floating to the top, with all played episdoes separated below. (unless there's a way to do that that I can't find?)
I'm struggling with this update. Several things appear to be broken still that were broken during the beta and caused me to opt out of the beta in order to use the app. My main problem: I have to fight the app to let me download podcasts. Sometimes it works, usually doesn't
Here's an example. Some of these auto downloaded. Some are stuck in queue. No matter what I do, I cannot download those two podcasts. I uncheck wifi, switch to cell, etc. This is the purpose of the app and if I can't download it's basically useless. Happened in beta too.
I’ve been having the same issue. The update is hot garbage all around. I’m moving to Podcast Republic.
Getting used to the new UI I know it will be tough but I see improvements there. One thing missing, episode size info is not showing, always good to have when on data and need to make the decision to download or not to download, keep up the good work.
Also queue time gives only time for queued episodes and not the overall including running episode.
You killed your baby you monsters
For current beta users how do we safely exit the beta without losing settings and such? Is the live version the same as the current beta?
any idea? I want to use the stable release of v7 and get off the beta track but am worried about losing settings and such.
Is there any plan to bring back support for the custom folder. I was using it to listen to audio books. I would rather not have to get another app for this.
I'm so happy! Thanks
PLAYLISTS!!! BRING THEM BACK!!
Loving the look great work! Now Galaxy Watch support pleaasseee ♥๏ธ
Just tell me how to easily add to up next. This update bloody well needs a walkthrough.
swipe from left to right!
If you're reading this and haven't updated DO NOT UPDATE. They ruined the app took most of the features away, and the design is awful.
There's great stuff here & it clearly is a vast improvement. What is missing? In-app warnings. Suddenly to lose all of my playlists & find my settings all turned off was v.upsetting. Really set me against the update this a.m. Plus support emails bounced from play store address.
Where is the option or filter that works like the following: Podcast I want to listen to > DOWNLOADED episodes of THAT podcast?
There doesn't seem to be an option to use a Podcast as a filter, making the filters useless.
Maybe try something revolutionary like having each podcast thumbnail represent its own podcasts, and within said podcast you can filter the downloaded ones from the played/not downloaded ones? I may have thought of this, but you can have it! take it! PLEASE!
Is there a way to manually initiate a download without having the episode play immediately? I have auto-download only on WiFi enabled, but I used to be able to hit the download button to get an episode regardless of network. Now that doesn't work.
I'm happy you're happy about this thing, and I'm so grateful for what has been my favourite app for the last x years, but... for my particular use case, functionality seems to have been torpedoed. Why do a new version that basically forces me to relearn the app?
Playlists were basically the one thing keeping me using Pocket Casts instead of a dozen other alternatives... guess you've already got my money, but I can't see recommending the app to friends anymore.
This is broken. I like the UI, but worse are the bugs.
- no badges anymore (I noticed the setting but it doesn't do anything)
- settings per podcast (e.g. listening speed) gone
- queue gone
- widget doesn't work
seems to be a slight delay in turning badges on and them appearing, which we apologize for. Per-podcast settings are not gone! Podcast feed > gear icon > Playback effects > Custom For This Podcast. And rebooting your phone should fix the widget issue
to clarify, settings per podcast were gone in the sense that what I tweaked was resetted
and where's the option to "mark all as played" on a certain playlist?
"Now it’s time for the baby to leave the nest. Version 7 is now available to all!"
Me :
I was able to figure it out quickly and I like the look and new options. no issues from me!
thanks! Great to hear :)
Is there a way to have all my downloaded episodes at the top, like before? That was a super nice feature for podcasts where I go far back and listen to old episodes.
we're looking at ways to let you filter downloads to the top for a future update. The old app didn't quite do that, but I get what you're saying. When you tapped download, the episode would be marked unplayed, and that's actually what used to move it up the list.
Interesting! I look forward to that update!
Related, how do I make unplayed show up at the top of the redesign? My podcast flow is totally ruined without it
you probably want to start by tapping the 3 dot button on the podcast page and choosing "Archive all played". Now you have nothing but unplayed episodes showing. We didn't want to auto-archive them for you and cause confusion, but from then on it works
You guys rocked it!
thanks!
Awesome job. Really enjoying the new version. Love the Alexa support. Any chance of getting variable speed as an option on there?
that would be great, but it would need Amazon to implement that on their side. We've let them know people want it and they are keen to take that feedback on board.
I love Pocket Casts now more than ever. The beta wasn't an easy experience to start off with, but it was SO worth it. Loving your work on a daily basis through Android, through Mac and through Amazon Echo.
thanks, appreciate the love!
How can I export the prevously downloaded podcasts, not the urls, I know how to do that, so I can move to another player? The podcasts don't have usable names to move and import. I was a huge advocate of this app for years, but the removal of playlists finishes it for me.
there's no universal standard for exporting anything but subscriptions. Eg: there's no format we could export those in other apps would know how to read.
Ok, thanks. What was the reasoning behind removing the playlists?
in reworking the app we found some features that conflicted with other ones, and had to decide which ones to keep and which ones to remove in order to make the app simpler. Sadly because it wasn't widely used, the multiple playlist feature didn't make the cut
I've been tinkering, because I do want to keep using this if I can. I know you removed playlists, but can you add more filter options? We might be able to get playlists back in a manner, if development choices prevent playlists as they were before.
we did add more filter options. What specific ones are you looking for?
In another tweet I asked about multiselect, which I really want back. How about doing a multi select but add the option to Star the selected episodes all at once? Starred eps is a filter choice, in combination with other filter options and playlists are back.
we're looking at doing multi-select in a future update, so that's good feedback, thanks!
Cool, thanks
I like the new look and I like seeing episode art in the player, but the removal of basic functionality makes it feel like a downgrade. No playlists, multiselect, easy way to delete. I loved having all downloaded episodes show up at the top of the feed. Is any of this coming back
you can delete really quickly, swipe right to left over an episode to archive it. Will delete any downloaded files and hide that episode from the filter/podcast you're in.
Ok, great. What about the other things? Are they going to be put back in during the next update, or is there a setting I am missing?
we're looking at ways to let you filter downloads to the top for a future update. The old app didn't quite do that, but I get what you're saying. When you tapped download, the episode would be marked unplayed, and that's actually what used to move it up the list.
depends, what did you use multiselect for?
i used it to add several episodes to Up Next (esp when going through a back catalogue). Can't seem to do that now. Only 10 mins in, but cant even seem to add single episode to Up Next.
OK - Figured out the add to Up Next thing (swipe right one at a time). Still some navigation issues, hopefully that's just a new thing at 5.30 in the morning problem on my side.
abort this baby
I am also running on Android 8.1
I'm lost, did I miss a tweet somewhere? It doesn't seem to have been linked so I'm not sure what it means that you're running Android 8.1?
After updating to version 7.0 my Bluetooth FM transmitter won't start playing the episode when hitting the play button on the device. I have to go into the app and hit play. This feature worked great before. Not complaining just letting you know so you guys can fix it. Thanks.
oh yep, found your other tweet. Sorry they didn't get linked up in our support tool for some reason
Its all good it was my fault. Did you get my email?
we have a tonne of emails, but I should be able to find it, thanks!
Sorry its just easier to email for me.
Lag lag lag, oneplus 5t, android 8
Fantastic Congrats and thanks.
That hard work paid off! @pocketcasts
thanks!
Your update sucks .
I'm not one to complain about software updates. I feel like I'm usually the one telling everyone to calm down. But this update made a few changes that immediately make the app harder to use.
Used to be I could see all the badges on the podcasts screen and immediately see what shows I was getting behind on or had new episodes. I can't fathom why those badges were removed.
got any examples?
still there. Podcast grid -> 3 dot button -> Change the "Badges" setting to "All unfinished". You might have to home button out of the app and come back to get them to load the first time.
Good to know. Thanks! There's a bigger one that might be a deal breaker. When I select a show it used to let me put episodes at the top of the feed. Can I do that? If a show has hundreds of episodes and I'm listening in the middle it would be a huge pain to dig for episodes.
yeah that's still an option. To migrate over to the new way you might need to use the "Archive all played" feature on the podcast page. That will hide all the episodes v6 marked as played. From then on you should be good to go.
So the old app used to mark all but the newest episode as played for you. We heard from lots of people that was bad, since they didn't play them and later couldn't figure out which they did and didn't play. You can get to the same place in v7 quickly though... 1/2
... long press on the second episode of your newly subscribed podcast and choose "Archive all from here". Now you just have 1 episode. If you ever want to go back and find old ones, you know which are played and which aren't :) 2/2
Interesting...I never used the archive feature because it never made sense to me. I want to see everything. I don't want any of it hidden. It would be nice to bring that back but nice to know you didn't completely break everything, just mostly :-)
So do I no longer delete episodes? I archive and that deletes and hides them?
archive just hides them, and deletes any downloaded files for that episode. You can always see them by turning on "Show Archived" on the podcast page if/when you want to
So if I archive a single episode it deletes it as well? There's no longer a dedicated delete? Just trying to understand the new flow.
you can still just delete a file if you want to. Tap the episode, tap the downloaded tick. Most people don't seem to want to do that action by itself though, which is why it's two taps.
Hey @pocketcasts , thanks for talking me off the ledge. Change is hard but it seems like the features I need are still there, just different. I appreciate the quick responses on this.
The swipe gestures, with append/prepend to playlist is inspired!
The new app is a pain,slow to use and load up useing a S8
Pocket casts is my favorite app to listen to. But the new version is not as smart phone friendly. Swiping was easier to use than buttons that are now spread out. Can I go back to the old UI!? Thanks!