I've tried or am trying every podcast listening application I can find. My requirements are simple:
What I don't need:
Essentially I want to open an app and see a list of my feeds, ordered by most recent update. I want to click on a feed and see al ist of available episodes. I want to click on an episode and have it start streaming.
It seems simple, but every app out there seems to want to be too much. They focus on discovery, or listening to podcasts episodes that match search results, etc. Why can't I find a simple player that does the job and "just works?"
So far I've tried:
Google Listen
Google Listen's episode-centric interface makes it difficult and cumbersome to navigate through episodes available from a specific feed. The app seems to constantly be wanting you to discover new podcasts or listen to random podcasts based on some subject you might be interested in. It also is pretty buggy when it comes to streaming.
Acast
Does not support streaming some feeds for some reason - like cnet's buzz out loud which I listen to every day. Seems to have lots of errors when updating or trying to stream.
Doggcatcher
Tried it out for a few days, can't remember why but it wasn't working out. I think it was difficult to navigate to my feeds.
Beyondpod
Seems to want to play everything in the video player - meaning lack of decent control of playback.
Stitcher
Does not allow you to add your own feeds, and does not support 1.5x
Mediafly
Difficult to add new feeds. Website won't validate for some feeds. Everything is organized into channels instead of being organized by podcast. Podcasts end up all over the place.
- Streaming ability
- Decent error recovery
- Ability to add any feed
What I don't need:
- Video
- Discovery
- Playlists
Essentially I want to open an app and see a list of my feeds, ordered by most recent update. I want to click on a feed and see al ist of available episodes. I want to click on an episode and have it start streaming.
It seems simple, but every app out there seems to want to be too much. They focus on discovery, or listening to podcasts episodes that match search results, etc. Why can't I find a simple player that does the job and "just works?"
So far I've tried:
Google Listen
Google Listen's episode-centric interface makes it difficult and cumbersome to navigate through episodes available from a specific feed. The app seems to constantly be wanting you to discover new podcasts or listen to random podcasts based on some subject you might be interested in. It also is pretty buggy when it comes to streaming.
Acast
Does not support streaming some feeds for some reason - like cnet's buzz out loud which I listen to every day. Seems to have lots of errors when updating or trying to stream.
Doggcatcher
Tried it out for a few days, can't remember why but it wasn't working out. I think it was difficult to navigate to my feeds.
Beyondpod
Seems to want to play everything in the video player - meaning lack of decent control of playback.
Stitcher
Does not allow you to add your own feeds, and does not support 1.5x
Mediafly
Difficult to add new feeds. Website won't validate for some feeds. Everything is organized into channels instead of being organized by podcast. Podcasts end up all over the place.
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