Automatically play through a podcast episodes

Feature request
1

Problem you may be having, or feature you want:

Autoplay next episode mode

Suggested solution:

Add a streaming mode which after an episode is completed it goes to the next sequential episode in the podcast.

Screenshots / Drawings / Technical details:

Unless my way of listening to podcasts is less common than I thought (listening through from the beginning through to the most recent episodes) it seems strange and cumbersome that the app has no way of going to the next episode in order if you’re not listening to the most recent one.

I know other podcast apps seem to have this feature so I assume it’s relatively doable.

The only workaround seems to be to add the whole podcast to the queue which feels clunky and cumbersome. (Also for anyone switching to the player as I am it means selecting and marking as read hundreds of episodes, then adding only the remaining unlistened ones to the queue-putting hundreds of episodes in the queue which feels like an unnecessarily complex workaround.

I think I saw an old (and locked) discusion of this which seemed to just fizzle out without resolution, so sorry about the repeat I just wanted to indicate there is interest for this.

If the technical challenges of this are more than I think they are given there’s a workaround I understand and mods are free to mask this as resolved-i just thought I’d suggest it as a way to possibly lower switching costs from other apps.

2

It has been discussed several times. Main point is that there is no support for multiple queues or what you are asking.
You can look at issue 1533 which is asking what you want.
Hopefully one day someone would implement it and it will be merged / accepted. :crossed_fingers:

3

Yeah, really strange that such an excellent podcast player cannot read a simple podcast! :blush:
But despite many requests, and for years, no developer so far is interested in this very basic feature (although technically complex likely).
This is the main miss in antennapod IMHO.

4

TBH it is not something I ever do. If I subscribe to a long-running podcast then I gradually work my way through the backlog as and when time allows while keeping on top of current episodes. The effort needed to multi-select and add all episodes to the queue is commensurate with me ever wanting to listen to, say a shortish drama series, all in one go.

So, I would say that your way of listening is less common (although no less valid).

5

Actually none of us can state whether this is a common way or not :wink:.
Yet, all other podcast players I know have that feature. That’s all.
Let me explain a contradiction within antenna pod itself: you can “install” a given podcast on your phone’s home page as a shortcut, to have a direct access to it without navigating in the app itself. But what is the point? Because once there, if you play an episode, the next episode will not be the next one in the podcast, it will be whatever you have in the play queue.
The area is really half cooked in antennapod so far, and quite frustrating because otherwise antennapod is rather close to perfection. Minus that! :blush:

6

Voted but also commenting to confirm that this is still something users are wanting! Especially because my kids listen to a lot of podcasts which are indeed sequential stories, but also tend to be short (15 or 20 minutes). I don’t want their podcast to end and then the next most current of my own podcast subscriptions to start playing, and it’s dangerous to fiddle with it in the car. I think people either listen to podcasts one way or another, and it would be a great feature to toggle either “play next in queue” or “play next in series”. It’s so frustrating now that I have kids that I am thinking I’ll have to switch to another player or (gag) spotify so I can easily listen in the car with them. I realize people like me may be in the minority, listening to a single podcast start to end, but it’s a huge feature for me and quite nearly is making the player unusable in a family setting. I absolutely love the app otherwise and wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it for those who are listening as an individual who only wants most current.

7

You could use another player in the car specifically to play your children’s podcasts. That way you would not have to change the way you listen to your own podcasts.

8

I realize I’m replying to a very old post… but I have a unique reason for wanting this function.

I rip DVDs of TV shows, movies, etc and encode them on my server as podcasts. When I’m going through a sequential season or book audio, I want the system to play in order of oldest to newest, and I want it to continue queueing the next episode. I hate to have to go back to the subscription screen, find the podcast, scroll to the next episode and start it.

9

I know I’m late to the party, but this would be a super useful feature. I’ve recently started using antennapod and this is really my only wish. I listen to several podcasts that are ongoing storylines (and several that aren’t but… ). Adding to my que is time consuming and being new here, skipping an episode due to my lack of attention, had me wondering how I missed a huge progression in the story until I realized. Obviously user error, but it would be a nice option.

I have no other gripes! I can’t believe it took me so long to find this!

10

We 100% need this! Otherwise this app is so cool and I would like to spread it, but missing this feature is a big downgrade :frowning:

11

any sign of this feature on the horizon? seems such a key use case to be missing, i.e. open app, find a podcast, press play on episode 1, expect subsequent episodes to follow automatically - its how almost any other podcast player works.

12

Alright alright alright alright!

So the queue is the issue. I don’t like the queue and even less, the inbox, and can’t understand their purpose.

I download an episode each week, and manually refresh podcasts, never auto refresh, because I have a decent idea of when there may be an episode available.

I am so glad people are talking about queue up a portion of a backlog of episodes, glad people don’t just listen to the most recent.

So, whatever the queue is doing, why not simply make a backup copy, and make a new, clear queue, which seems like the devs don’t want to do.

Maybe get a mockup idea using AI to help create two custom queues, and allow a podcast specifically, to use a separate, or custom queue. This seems like the solution.

I use VLC on android for playback, (I have an iPhone now, and do not recommend Android for primary smartphone, too much data collection)

with vlc, I can add folders to browse, and for each file I can add to play queue if I know I’ll want to queue up a couple episodes of even different podcast folders. I don’t even do this, but I could and I see the convenience and usefulness.

I would like a way to disable queue and inbox entirely, they are zero use to me. Another thing, I do not want to see the statistics page on a sideways swipe, TMI and I guess I could clear it since it’s inaccurate anyways because I have imported the database a couple times now, so it’s not a complete stat count, so maybe an option to clear or disable all of this too.

13

It sounds like this is not the podcast app you are looking for. The Queue and the Inbox are central to how it organises things.

Have you tried other apps to see if they fit more closely with your usage?

14

I’ve been using Antennapod since 2018 or 2017, long before these additional areas were added.

I use antennapod because it is 100% open-source, and works fine except for the server certificate issue, which I don’t take away appreciation, just a technical thing which has continuously been worked on.

Antennapod is for me, and no I won’t use other programs. I like this one, no ads, and open-source.