As a new user, I’m confused with the data flow of the subscribed podcasts and why new podcasts don’t seem to appear automatically in the “Queue”. When exactly do podcasts get copied to the Queue? I’m using the Queue as I want to play all the (new) podcasts automatically (i.e. without having to click them).
New episodes are shown on Episodes»New. There you can decide if you actually like to listen to them or not. “New” means that you have not yet decided what to do with the episode.
- If you are not interested in an episode, just swipe it away and AntennaPod removes the “new” flag. The episode still stays marked as unplayed and you can find it on the Episodes»All page, as well as on the podcast’s page.
- If you are interested in the episode, you can do one of two things, depending on your listening behavior.
- Download the episode. When downloading, AntennaPod also automatically adds the episode to the queue and removes the “new” flag. There is a setting if you want new episodes to be enqueued in the back, front or after the currently playing episode. Downloading is the main way AntennaPod was originally designed to be used but as streaming is becoming more and more popular, you can also use the second option.
- Just add the episode to the queue. AntennaPod automatically removes the “new” flag and inserts it into the queue. You can later directly play the episode without having to download, so it does not take up space. Think: Streaming like videos on YouTube. The disadvantage is that it will not be available offline, uses up your mobile data connection when you are on the run, and makes skipping a little bit slower (and puts more load on the podcast host’s servers).
- If you are done playing, AntennaPod marks the episode as played and removes it from the queue. There is a setting to also automatically delete the download after playing. You can find a list of all episodes that are still downloaded to your device (whether they are in the queue or not) on the Downloads»Completed page.
- If you like an episode and are thinking about listening to it again, you can also mark it as favorite. It will then appear on the Episodes»Favorites page and (by default) will not be deleted after playing.
In case you are subscribed to a really great podcast where you know from the beginning that all episodes will be great, you can use the auto-download feature. When enabled for a podcast, all of its future new episodes are automatically downloaded and added to the queue. They will not appear on the “new” page.
If you are interested in more details about the “new”, “played” and “unplayed” states of episodes, you can read on here.
I hope that this text makes it easier to get started with AntennaPod. Just curious: Did you have a look at the documentation section of our new website already? Do you think it would help to have this text listed there? Is the text missing something that would help new users like you to get started?
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That’s just what I was looking for - thank you.
And yes, I looked at every item & sub-item on the ‘documentation’ page and the info you gave me above appears nowhere. I’d recommend adding your info above to the ‘Getting Started’ page as an overview or flowchart or similar.
Thanks again 
PS Re. the documentation: I think you assume that the data flow is self-evident, but it’s not! New users really need an ‘overview’.
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Do you think the text should be enhanced in some aspects to be more clear? You as a new user have a “fresh eye” on AntennaPod, so your feedback can help to make the text better for other new users.
Would you mind drawing a draft for the flow-chart or (even better) the version we can put on the website? AntennaPod is developed by volunteers and we could definitely need some help from non-developers who would like to put some love into the rather empty documentation pages.
I’ll have a go at that soon, where/how should I send it to you?
You said
But I’ve got all my podcast set as auto-download but they don’all appear in the Queue…?
I took the liberty to edit your post because the citation from my post got messed up a bit.
Just here on the forum would be great 
In case you know the program “inkscape”, charts drawn with that are easier to translate and modify later on than actual drawings (eg in GIMP or Paint).
Auto-download only considers episodes that are newly published. So you have to wait for a new episode to arrive before seeing the effect. In the meantime, you can manually add things to the queue that sound interesting.
OK
I think I’ll just use text, maybe like pseudo-code or similar. But don’t wait up for me
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Hi ByteHamster,
I’ve got a load of questions. Could we do this per email instead of cluttering up the forum with noise?
Hi @ottootts
Thanks for chipping in on the forum! Such questions are very valuable. If you wanted to do the flow chart in text, I can try & help putting it in a visual format.
Please share all your questions here! It helpsus all understand different use-cases. And others might have the same questions and benefit from the answers. They certainly don’t ‘clutter the forum with noise’! They’re what the forum is for 
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OK, here are a couple of questions I have:
I just noted that in Downloads a new episode appeared with the deletion icon, but it didn‘t appear in the Queue although all podcasts are set to ‚Keep Updated‘ and ‚Include in auto-downloads‘. Please explain…
Got a load of episodes in Downloads with the deletion icon (i.e. I assume they were downloaded), but they never appeared in the Queue. Why not?
In Downloads/Completed the newest entry is 23 January, but in Episodes there are newer episodes, but they are marked with the download icon. Why wern‘t they auto-downloaded as set in the subscription settings?
In Episodes how can I download many (100s) episodes with one command?
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In the settings you can go to Playback » Queue » Enqueue Downloaded. Is that setting enabled?
@ByteHamster Is that enabled by default for new installs? If not, what do you think of chsngi5 that?
My guess would be that the Episode Cache is full. You can see this from the presence of a circle with an exclamation mark in the menu next to the Downloads entry.
If that’s the case, you can go to settings » Network » Automatic Download » Episode Cache to increase the cache or set it to unlimited.
That’s (currently) not possible. However, you can download all episodes per podcasts. Go to a podcast » vertical ellipsis (three dots) » Multi-select » square with the dotted line around it (top-right) » pencil FAB » Download.
Hope that helped! Let us know if anything is still unclear.
It is enabled by default.
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Yup
That could be the problem, I had it set to 100, but I certainly don’t have more that 100 downloaded (unless they’re hiding somewhere) and the warning icon is not there, so I don’t think that is the problem. But I’ve set it to unlimited to be safe.
OK. As I have about 50 subscriptions it would be a hassle though and I’d have to do it each time. Can I suggest it as a feature. I’m seen somewhere one can mass-delete. Use the same mechanism for downloading?
As I already had automatic download configured, it doesn’t seem to be working for me.
I just rechecked and I’ve got several new episodes in “Episodes” but they are all marked as downloadable, but I’ve set “Include in auto downloads” in all my subscriptions. Why aren’t they automatically downloaded? Looks like a bug to me.
EDIT
I just checked the subscription’s “Episode Filter” and neither ‘Include’ nor ‘Exclude’ is checked. Could that be the problem? If one sets “include in auto downloads” then surely ‘Include’ ought to be checked.
/EDIT
Many thanks for your help!
You say that ‘Enqueue Downloaded’ is enabled. Then I can’t think of another reason why they wouldn’t be in the Queue. @ByteHamster any other ideas?
Given that you didn’t see the exclamation mark it shouldn’t be the Episode Cache. Other option: you set prerequisites to the environment (e.g. must be plugged; certain WiFi networks only) and because they’re not fulfilled nothing is currently downloading. Didn’t ask but I assume you have Automatic Download enabled
And by default AntennaPod limits simultaneous downloads - if it needs to download tens/hundreds of episodes, they might be queued for downloading, but I’m not sure if in that case it should show the ‘downloading’ icon (circle with dot & cross).
If the field is empty, then nothing is filtered (i.e. all should download, so this can’t be the issue).
Then it looks like there is a problem either in my config or in the feature.
My config:
Subscriptions
Keep updated - checked
Include in auto downloads - checked
Settings
Network
Update interval - 2 hours
Automatic Download - checked
Episode Cache - was 100, now unlimited
Download when not charging - checked
Mobile updates - only cover, but constant wi-fi
is there another setting to check?
Is there any debug log (or similar) I could enable?
Extra Info:
This is on a new smartphone. I used the export/import feature to transfer my old config to the new smartphone. On the old one everything worked. Could it be a bug in the export/import feature? I can upload the export db if that would help…
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Update…
In Episodes I clicked the update/sync button and it downloaded a bunch of episodes, then they disappeared but were in the Queue. Maybe the problem was only with the auto-update function…
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AP records logs that you can export. You can export them from Settings » Report bug » Export logs. Please note this may contain sensitive data (e.g. your subscriptions), and shouldn’t be shared publicly. I’ll let the experts judge whether such export is actually useful to look at.
What did you import? OPML or the AP database?
I relatively recently switched phones as well and used the database export/import – didn’t experience any issues (and haven’t seen similar issues to what you’re describing).
- The only thing to expect would be that if episodes had been downloaded on the previous phone (had ‘downloaded’ status in the database) they would still have the ‘play’ button which turns into ‘download’ when the app notices the database value is incorrect (b/c on the new phone the file isn’t there).
- If on your previous phone the episodes somehow got their ‘autodownload active’ status removed (e.g. because they were streamed, or downloaded & then removed) they would still not be auto-downloaded now.
When episodes are downloaded or viewed, they loose the ‘NEW’ label. So they’re expected to disappear from the New tab of the Episodes screen, and (with your settings) be available in the queue.
I used the AP database method. The subscriptions retained their auto-download status.
That explains most of my problems. I’ll check if the auto-download is now working.
Thanks again for your help!
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