The Inbox does not refresh and other issues

Support
1

App version: 3.10.0 (from the Google Play Store)

Android version: 7.0

Device model: ASUS Zenfone Max Plus (M1)

Expected behaviour: New podcast episodes would appear in the inbox after refreshing the inbox.

Current behaviour: The inbox does not refresh (automatically or manually). An automatic refresh will start, with the refresh notification appearing at the top of the screen and the circle spinning, but it only lasts for 5-6 seconds, before the refresh just ends without loading any podcasts. If I attempt to manually refresh the inbox, the circle spins for a few seconds before it ends, and then produces the message: “Please wait some time before refreshing podcasts again.”

First occurred: First noticed that the inbox would not refresh on Oct. 31, 2025.

Steps to reproduce:

  1. I first noticed that the inbox was no longer refreshing on Oct. 31. Attempts to manually refresh the inbox were also unsuccessful and produced the message: “Please wait some time before refreshing podcasts again.” I left the AntennaPod app alone for several hours before trying again, with no change. I verified that my app setting for “new episodes action” has always been set to “add to inbox”. I reduced the “refresh podcasts” frequency from “every 2 hours” to “every day”. During the following week, I waited for longer periods of time (over 24 hours) before trying to refresh the inbox again, but this did not change anything.

  2. I did notice however when checking the “Download log”, that it had recorded error messages starting from Nov. 24th, where the connection to several podcasts feeds had failed to connect, or had an message like “I/O error”. This occurred for around 7 or 8 podcasts from different podcast publishers, so the odds that all of these publishers messed up their feeds in the same week seems quite unlikely. There were no messages in the download log after Oct. 30.

  3. At the end of the week (Nov. 7), I tried the “Force stop” option in my Android settings, but this did not appear to change anything. I rebooted my cellphone, but this did not change anything either. Then I cleared the cache storage for the AntennaPod app, by using the “Clear cache” button in my Android settings. This just made things worse, and made the AntennaPod app less functional. After clearing the cache, I was no longer able to click on any of the episodes in my “downloads” list, in order to read the episode descriptions, because the app would just produce an endless spinning circle and would refuse to load, regardless of how long I waited. However, I was still able to listen to podcasts by hitting the play button directly from the downloads list.

  4. At this point, I figured that my best option would be to delete the AntennaPod app, and to start over with a fresh installation of the app. To ensure that I would retain some record of my podcast subscriptions, I tried a “database export’. This did not work and just produced an endless spinning circle. It was unclear if it was working at all or was just really slow, and after waiting for 2 hours I gave up. The database file it produced contained no data (0 bytes). I then tried the “Favorites export”, which had the same issue and produced the same result. The “OPML export” function did appear to work and produced an OPML file.

  5. I uninstalled AntennaPod, rebooted my cellphone, and the downloaded a fresh installation of the AntennaPod app straight from the Google Play Store. I thought that this would finally bring an end to this issue, but when I went to “import podcast list (OPML)”, and selected the OPML file that I had saved on the phone, the “OPML import” page just produces an endless spinning circle, and does not load a list of podcasts for me to confirm. So, then I tried to add individual podcast subscriptions manually. I am able to search for the name of each podcast, and the app loads a correct list of search results, but when I click on a search result (which should result in the podcast popping up in a slightly smaller window that allows you to view a description, the list of episodes, and most importantly the “subscribe” button), the smaller window pops up with another endless spinning circle. So now I have a fresh installation of the AntennaPod app, but I am unable to add any podcasts to it.

  6. Other Android podcast apps appear to be work without any issues (e.g. Podbean, etc.). I have checked my phone’s battery settings and have changed the setting for “AntennaPod” to “Not optimized”, but this did not help. The “Choose data folder” setting for AntennaPod is set to: “/storage/emulated/0/Android/data/de.danoeh.antennapod/files”. Is there some sort of setting or feature that I need to enable/disable to get AntennaPod to work? Or is my phone just too old? Or does AntennaPod not support over a certain number of subscriptions? Any advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

Environment: It’s an ASUS cellphone. It’s kind of an old phone, I guess? (32GB Storage and 2.7GB Memory). I started using AntennaPod around 16 months ago (after Google podcasts shutdown) and I’ve been very happy with it. I had not changed any of the app settings since setting it up 16 months ago. I have about 60 podcast subscriptions and around 170 episodes downloaded. I nearly always download podcast episodes from my inbox once or twice a day, and then listen to the downloaded episodes offline.

Crash info:

2

Same here.

Android version: 7.0

Device Model: Samsung Tablet S2

First occurred: Inbox refreshed the list a last time on Nov. 13. 2025

3

This means that you have already refreshed within the last 30 seconds

What is the full message you get when clicking the item?

4

On my personal opinion the app is not resilient to slow connection that’s why it does not work appropriately on downloads and refreshments.

5

I am also having the same issue, I had to change back to PocketCast because it was driving me nuts. I love the app otherwise, the battery savings are so good not to mention no ads or nonsense.

Super grateful to the coders of the app! I hope someone is able to track down this issue at some point!

6

This looks like the same issue I’m having with Android 7.0 since the last update.

7

Thanks for responding!

Unfortunately, I’m afraid I can’t provide more details about the error messages in the “Download log” because I uninstalled the AntennaPod app, and then reinstalled the AntennaPod app. So currently when I go to click on the “Download log”, it is blank (and I’m afraid I didn’t take a screenshot of the error messages at that time, before I uninstalled the app). Since I am currently not able to add any podcast subscriptions to the app, I cannot even attempt to download any episodes, and therefore the “Download log’ remains blank.

My best recollection of the error messages is that there were 2 or 3 different kinds of error messages, affecting around 7 or 8 different podcasts from different publishers. One of those error messages referenced a “I/O error”, and another error message mentioned a “failed connection” or something like that. That’s about all I can remember.

8

Any chance this gets fixed or should I buy a new phone? Thank for the great app

9

Environment

Android version: 16
OS version: 6.1.134-android14-11-g66e758f7d0c0-ab13748739
AntennaPod version: 3.11.0
Model: Pixel 9 Pro XL
Device: komodo
Product: komodo
Manufacturer: Google

I haven’t had any podcast auto refresh since just before Christmas. They will if I go into each subscription page and pull down. Then it pulls in new episodes. I have to individually do that per subscription and none do that on their own anymore

10

I can’t in good mind recommend an app that would leave this issue dormant and unsolved for all of 2026.. I’ve reinstalled multiple times and struggling to view it as worth the headache. Clearly people here don’t value it as worth the headache, this particular thread is soon to die without any resolution to an app-breaking issue.

I have an S23, my buddy has some Moto somethin or another. Both have had repeated failures refreshing podcasts since December, maybe November. The only thing thay saves it is a reinstall until it gets too crowded and then, boop, the app sh1ts the bed again. Very frustrating, and seriously this is probably the most crucial big to be ironed out but you’ll find the devs doing hobby coding on issues that, just don’t matter as much as this does.

Please guys, straighten up the priorities. Nobody wants a ‘feature complete’ app, if the app can’t make use of any of those features. Focus on fixing your sh!t over here, you know, the main functionality of your app? then go have fun and d!ck off doin whatever else but straight up this does not work and the fact this thread was gonna just up and die without me b1tching at yall is embarassing, fix your sh1t.

11

I had the same problem when I reinstalled the app. The inbox refuses to refresh and I didn’t get any new episode on till the next day. All the previous episodes refuses to populate the inbox. I did a fresh install and same thing happened. It’s just so unfortunate that I can’t assess my previous episodes on the App.