App slow startup + crashing due to corrupted database — fix that worked

1

Hi everyone,

I’ve been an AntennaPod user since 2020 and have accumulated a lot of listening data (almost 9,900 hours :sweat_smile:) — so losing my database was not an option.

Issue experienced

  • AntennaPod would take 2–3 minutes to launch

  • Often triggered an “App not responding” prompt

  • The app eventually crashed and generated:

    • corruptedDatabaseBackup.db

    • A crash log

  • Restoring the DB worked briefly, but the app would soon crash again and rewrite the corrupted DB

Device / Versions

  • Android 16

  • AntennaPod 3.10.0

What I tried (unsuccessfully)

  • Restoring crashed DB inside the app

  • Uninstalling and reinstalling AntennaPod

What actually solved it

  1. Copied the corrupted database to a computer

  2. Opened the DB using sqlite3
    sqlite3 CorruptedDatabaseBackup.db

  3. Ran integrity check:

    PRAGMA integrity_check;

    → Reported 22 problematic indexes

  4. Rebuilt the broken indexes:

    REINDEX;

  5. (Optional, but recommended) Cleaned up the database:

    VACUUM;

  6. Re-ran integrity check — no errors :tada:

  7. Copied the fixed DB back to the phone

  8. Imported the repaired DB into AntennaPod

Result: App launches normally again and no more crashes.

Hope this helps anyone else who runs into a similar corrupted database issue — especially if you have years of listening history like me.
Many thanks to the devs for such a great open-source podcast app! :raising_hands:

3 Likes