Pocket Casts is launching a new feature to help people listen together: episode playlists that let you and your friends or family add episodes to a shared playlist irrespective of shows, or call in the app’s algorithm to generate lists automatically with smart rules. The move continues to draw deep lines of personalization in one of the most beloved independent podcast apps and further sharpens its positioning against heavyweight platforms.
What’s New and How Episode Playlists Work in Pocket Casts
Playlists come in two flavors. Manual playlists allow you to handpick episodes from any show you follow, which is great for assembling a lineup for that long car trip or an epic queue of stuff to catch up on over the weekend. You’ll find the feature under the Playlists tab in your queue; tap the plus icon on mobile or select New Playlist on desktop to begin adding episodes.
Smart Playlists are rule‑based. Tapping Smart Rules brings in filters for episodes (their duration, whether they’re unplayed, and whether they’re already downloaded). In need of a snappy commuter mix, around 25 minutes an episode? Set a time filter and unplayed status, and the list will auto-update with every new episode.
And because these are episode‑level lists, they work well for themes that span shows — consider climate explainers across several outlets; an author’s guest appearances during a book tour; or a sequence of starter episodes to listen to if you’re first delving into true crime.
Why Playlists Matter for Podcast Listening Habits
Listening to a podcast is all about routine, but the paradox of choice can lead some people to freeze. Playlists also help remove friction by organizing a library of hundreds of episodes into thoughtful sequences. The result is longer listening sessions and higher completion rates — metrics that podcast apps obsess over because they correlate with retention.
The feature pulls Pocket Casts into line with power‑user tools elsewhere. Overcast has had Smart Playlists for a while and Apple Podcasts does support custom Stations. Pocket Casts’ interpretation combines this sophistication with an accessible setup that’s likely to appeal both to long‑time podcast fans and anyone who simply wants a quick, reliable playlist without needing to micromanage their Up Next.
Competitive Context and Growth for Pocket Casts
Owned by Automattic, the company that also operates Tumblr and WordPress.com, Pocket Casts has actually been investing in the sorts of features that drive sticky use out of a podcast app without necessarily locking content away behind walled gardens. The company has made its web player free recently, a change that was designed to reduce friction for listeners who switch between desktops and mobile devices throughout the day.
Plenty of people do: Pocket Casts counts about 60,000 paying subscribers — small compared with services like Spotify and Apple that count hundreds of millions of listeners worldwide, but the app has strong enthusiast cachet for its reliability, cross‑platform support and editorial touches. In a world that Edison Research still continues to measure incremental growth in weekly podcast listening across these United States, light-touch curation systems like playlists can be worth the effort.
Availability and Rollout Across Web, Desktop, and Mobile
Episode Playlists have already been released on the web and desktop apps. Android support begins to roll out today, with iOS on deck. That staggered release is in line with how the company operates and would suggest that the feature is being built for parity across platforms rather than as a single, mobile-based add‑on.
For travelers, the option to pre-download a playlist before hopping on a flight is an easy quality-of-life improvement. That’s where a Smart Playlist that always reveals short, unplayed episodes comes in handy for daily habits, and enables you to act instead of hunting through feeds when you have 20 minutes to spare.
Ideas to Try Now for Building Better Podcast Playlists
- Build a Starter Pack: Create a handhold playlist to introduce someone new to a genre — five evergreen tech explainers, five culture deep cuts, five narrative pilots for true crime (and so on).
- Commute Mix: Smart Rules for unplayed episodes under 25 minutes, optionally filtered to news and daily briefings to have something fresh every morning.
- Guest Tracker: Add episodes where a favorite journalist, author or scientist is featured across different shows to track an idea as it evolves.
- Offline Essentials: Filter by shows and filter episodes to only display downloaded, unplayed episodes in your Listen Now for a travel‑ready list.
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By blending hands‑on curation with automation, Pocket Casts is offering listeners a flexible, no‑brainer way to design their own programming. For a medium that thrives on trust and habit, it’s a smart next step.