First look: Apple's Podcasts for iOS offers subscriptions, auto-downloads
Apple's official Podcasts app debuted on Tuesday in the App Store as a free download. Much like Apple previously split music and videos into separate applications, Podcasts for iOS gives downloadable Internet programming its own standalone space, separating it from the iTunes application.
With the new software, users are now presented with a new "Subscribe" link when they access a specific podcast. Subscribing to a podcast through Apple's new Podcasts application will update with newly added content when it's available.
Subscribing to a podcast also gives users the ability to turn on the "Auto-Download" functionality. Once this is enabled, users can choose how many episodes to keep, including "All Episodes," "All Unplayed Episodes," "Most Recent Episode," or up to the last 10 episodes.
Podcasts can also be sorted from newest to oldest or vice versa, and Apple also includes the option to mark all episodes as either played or unplayed.
The Podcasts application for iOS also includes the ability to share shows or specific episodes with other users via e-mail, Twitter or text message. Presumably with the launch of iOS 6 this fall, Facebook integration will also become part of the Podcasts application.
To search for podcasts, users tap the "Catalog" button in the upper left. This rotates the screen in the same manner that the digital bookshelf in Apple's iBooks application pulls up the iBookstore.
Once users access the podcast store, they are presented with an interface similar to the iTunes Store application found natively in iOS. There are three sections available to choose: "Featured," "Top Charts" and "Search." A tap of the "Library" button in the top right returns users to the main screen.
Another new feature is the "Top Stations" section found in the library portion of the Podcasts application. Here, a unique user interface in the style of a radio dial allows users to browse and discover podcasts in different categories.
Rotating the dial left to right brings up categories in alphabetical order, including "Arts," "Business" and "Comedy." Each of these categories can have a subcategory listed under it. For example, "Business" includes "Business News," "Investing," "Management & Marketing," and "Shopping."
Once a category and subcategory have been selected, the top station for that category is presented on the screen with a large logo. Users can then scroll downward to view the logos for podcasts in this category and discover new content.
Users are now also given the option to either stream an episode over Wi-Fi or a cellular data connection, or download and save the episode to have access to it when a connection may not be available.
Podcasts also features a sleep timer that will automatically stop playing a podcast while listening in bed, and users can also optionally sync episodes from iTunes on a Mac or PC.
Another great feature of the new Podcasts application is syncing of episode playback progress. This means users can pause a podcast on their iPhone, and pick up right where they left off later on their iPad.
One issue exists in the transition of podcasts away from the iOS "Music" application: The "Get More Episodes" link in the "Music" application still opens the iTunes app rather than Podcasts. Episodes downloaded through the Podcasts application still show up in the "Podcasts" section of the native Music app as well, allowing them to be played from either the Music app or the Podcasts app.
At first blush, the new functionality and discoverability offered by Apple's Podcasts application for iOS appears to make it a very worthwhile addition.
30 Comments
Does the app still keep the same 50MB limit previously had through downloading a podcast over cellular?
Very interesting! So how does this App back things up to your Mac? One of the big issues I have with ITunes is not being able to split my Library up onto different volumes. Podcasts can easily take up a lot of space on your disk volume that would be better allocated to other media. So ideally this app would work with something on the Mac so that we can designate a separate storage location for podcasts. Before anybody suggests it, no cloud storage is not the answer. There are multiple reasons but being without Internet access for long periods of time is a big one.
At first blush, the new functionality and discoverability offered by Apple's Podcasts application for iOS appears to make it a very worthwhile addition.
It also currently seems to maintain separate "Mark as Watched" flags between the Music (and Video) and Podcasts apps so if you have a podcast subscription in iTunes that gets synced to your iPhone but you also download and play the same episode through the Podcasts app - say while at work or out and about - the iTunes copy will still get synced as unplayed until you play it through the Music app. It looks like this is also true the other way round so playing a synced podcast episode through Music won't flag that episode as Played in Podcasts...
I'm assuming (hoping!) that this will be fixed in iOS 6 and is because the Music and Video apps need to be updated to integrate better with the Podcasts app which would require an iOS update as they are shipped as part of the OS and is not individually updateable...
I just received the "Item Over 50MB"... message over cellular.
Please test how it works with Podcast subscriptions that require a userid and password in order to pull down the latest podcasts. That works well in iTunes.