Still have that annoying bug act up occasionally, when — after returning to the app after doing other stuff for a while — and tapping play on the podcast I was listening to, it just jumps to a completely different podcast episode, and starts playing that other one from scratch…
Have to then manually find what I was listening to, and restart it again, manually.
Anyone else still seeing this?
Yeah, I see this, but it’s slightly less of an issue for me as I use one Playlist, so I’m always listening to the episode at the top of the list, so it skips to the second.
Yes, I have this happen on occasion. It’s almost always the next episode of whatever podcast I was listening to. It tends to happen most when resuming play after doing something else for a while (maybe something that involved other audio source? I have to pay more attention the next time it happens).
I gave it this long, but I confess that I’m actively trying out other apps at this point even though my subscription just renewed. Everything is too many taps and swipes. Nothing feels intuitive (to me) anymore. Occasional crashes and frequent stutters and slowdowns. What was my favorite workhorse app just isn’t so any more.
Also, a few weeks ago it appeared to me that he introduced a “feature” that prevents skipping chapters (from the chapters list) while you’re in an ad chapter of ATP? You could skip 30s forward, but you couldn’t jump to another chapter with a tap. It was a very odd experience that was hopefully a bug but possibly intentional.
This bug drives me absolutely insane, hopefully he gets it fixed.
The only issues I have run into with the new Overcast has been the macOS version but that one is an iOS port so I expect some degree of clunkiness. This is bizarre to me.
I still have several months left on my subscription, but I have switched back to Apple Podcasts. I’m not a fan of how it occasionally populates Up Next with podcasts I’ve never subscribed to, etc. but it works reliably.
Does anything else sound as good as Overcast ? Ive used it for years… when I try other podcast apps they sound a lot worse … Tinny, hard to hear the voices etc… plus the smart playback speed. These 2 features keep me with Overcast
I have switched to Apple Podcasts, too. For several reasons: localization, Siri integration and yes, even the UI. But Overcast for sure does sound better, if a podcast is not produced well. The time-saving incentives with Overcast’s Smart Speed are not important to me: I am enjoying podcasts the way how they have been published - or I stop listening to them altogether. The thing is that I apparently do not listen to many podcasts that are not produced well, so that I am fine with that.
There are other 3rd party clients that have similar features improving the audio like Pocket Casts (KB article) and Castro (MacStories review), but I don’t have first-hand experience and I do not bother too much about those features given my situation (well-produced podcasts).
+1
Agreed. I have tried many podcast apps and
I always come back to Pocket Casts. I’m got in from before it became a subscription application , so I don’t pay a monthly fee for it, either.
I primarily use it on iPhone, though I’ve dabbled with the Web player and new(to me) macOS app. I generally listen to podcasts while I’m away from
my computer, so iPhone app suits me best.
I’m now willing to claim that it’s not a bug but is intentional. I will happily retract if proven otherwise.
Listen to accidental tech podcast.
Use the Overcast app via CarPlay.
Get to a commercial in the podcast.
Tap the chapters button, and nothing happens.
Tap it again and again and nothing happens.
As soon as the commercial is over, tap the chapter button.
It will take you to the chapters list where you can skip forward to any other chapter.
This, to me, is exactly the kind of user hostile behavior that Marco rants about from other developers. He knows exactly what his users want to do in that moment and he has developed a feature that has no purpose other than preventing it or making it harder.
I’m trying to figure out why it would be JUST CarPlay. It works fine in the regular UI.
I’m having a really hard time believing that he hard-coded some sort of exception that only affects his show(s), that only prevents you from skipping ads, and only does it while CarPlay-ing. Especially since there are numerous people on Reddit in the past several months having all sorts of Overcast-related CarPlay issues.
It’s ultimately not possible to prove the negative though. 
I hear ya. This is why I hesitated originally to call it anything but a bug. Sure is odd though.
I get the same CarPlay bugs in Downcasts as I do in Overcast. It’s just in Overcast it shows up about half the time I use it, but in Downcasts only 5% of the time. I’m assuming both apps are using some of the same podcast audio code used in CarPlay, it’s just biting Overcast more on my phone.
It’s probably a bug, but I did post on here almost a year ago wondering about the divide between Overcast Marco and Podcast Marco,
I use Pocket Casts as I prefer pre selecting chapters at the beginning and letting the entire episode play without having it intervene, but I still feel like Marco not adding chapter skipping as a possibility due to the fact he hosts a podcasts w ads.
As far as I know, adding chapters to a podcast is a manual process. The podcaster has to upload timestamps and titles so that the podcast player/directory knows where the chapters start.
If Marco wanted to force someone to listen to an ad, the easier way to do it would be to not mark the ad as a chapter at all. That way the listener wouldn’t have the option of skipping it, whether ahead of time or otherwise. The fact that the ads ARE marked as chapters would seem to argue against both points.
Also, podcast advertisers pay per download, not per ad listen. By that measure, once you’ve downloaded the episode, the podcaster has been “paid.” Whether or not you listen to the ad doesn’t matter at that point, except for measuring ROI for the advertiser.
IMO, there is no divide. Marco is a developer and a podcaster, not a journalist. And most podcasters self promote (be my patron, subscribe via Apple Podcasts, etc) and/or have advertisers.
But unless we respond by using a special URL (buystuff.com/marco) or use a code when making a purchase, an advertiser can’t know if we listen to their commercials or not.
Of course if we use Spotify or other special players they can track everything. And if Overcast did that I’m sure someone would have quickly discovered it.
I would wager that this is antiquated. While it is true that you can’t really charge people per listen, advertisers are looking for the number of people that respond to the ad in a trackable way.
The first sponsorship is always a gamble, and that may be based on the claimed number of downloads. But any returning sponsorships – of which most podcasts have several – are based on ROI from the ad.
You are right, of course. The point I was making was that the listening itself is not measurable nor payable.