Auto-downloading too many episodes in a filter
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Hi, I have my “new releases” filter set to download the first 10 episodes, but there are currently more than 10 downloaded. Excluding the episodes on my queue (which is also set to auto download), there are 17 episodes downloaded from the filter.
Is this a bug? I assume it’s meant to download the first x episodes, and I then automatically remove the last ones as new episodes come in. But they don’t seem to be removing downloads correctly.
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There are many options provided in the app for how to auto download episodes, so it can easily get confusing. You can set things up in Filters, on the Podcast page, or in the Auto Download section of your settings. Because there are a few places that can effect how your episodes are downloaded it’s not uncommon to have unexpected results.
Double-checking all the filter options I’m not seeing a way to limit the number of podcast episodes that match a filter, on to limit them by release date time. Can you share a screenshot here of your exact settings? I’d like to investigate this further to get the results in the app you want for how many episodes are downloaded for you automatically.
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Hi, thanks for your reply! Happy to send a screenshot, but your message indicates to me that I might be misunderstanding how the filter auto-download options are supposed to work.
I have a “new releases” filter that consists of all unplayed / in progress episodes from the last month. It has about 40 episodes in it. If change my settings such that the only thing I auto-download across the whole app is the first 10 episodes of my “new releases” filter, it will correctly download the first 10 episodes. But then the next day if 2 more episodes get added to the playlist, it will download these 2 as well, and I will have 12 episodes downloaded. Eventually, all episodes on the filter are downloaded. My expectation was that at any given time I would only have the first 10 episodes in the filter downloaded, and it would “purge” the oldest downloaded episodes in the filter. If my understanding is wrong, I don’t really understand the point of the auto-download “first” feature- it starts out downloading the number of episodes you selected, but just grows over time!
I’ve tried to attach a screenshot below, but I’m not sure if it’ll go through- I’m getting an error message about how “this user is not allowed to post” and the image becomes grayed out.
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Thanks for explaining a bit more @dannyl9979. I think you’re right and there’s a bit of a misunderstanding happening here.
The setting you’re asking about at filter > menu top-right > filter options > toggle on auto download doesn’t limit the number of episodes downloaded, but rather ensures that the top x amount of episodes ( in your case 10) in the filter get downloaded – it doesn’t relate to the total amount of episodes that have download files within the filter. I hope that makes sense!
I think you may like to try this instead:
- Head to Settings> Auto download. Enable “up next” so that when an episodes is added to your Up Next list it gets downloaded
- Head to Settings> Auto add to Up Next. Set your Auto Add limit at 10
- In Settings> Auto tap Choose Podcasts and select the ones you want to automatically download the most recent episodes for.
This means your app will automatically download the first 10 episodes those podcasts publish after you set this up and add them to your next up list. As you make more space by listening more will then be added to your Up Next list and downloaded, but no more than 10.
I hope that helps! I think you may also find the Auto-archive feature useful as that will remove the download when an episode is auto archived https://support.pocketcasts.com/knowledge-base/archiving-episodes-2/
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Thanks for the reply- that does make sense, it’s not what I expected but glad this is expected behavior rather than a bug! I guess I’d encourage you all to consider changing it to work the way I describe, but if people already rely on it functioning the way it does I understand.
I had already set up what you describe with auto-adding podcasts to up next and then auto-downloading the first x episodes in up next, and it does accomplish what I want! I was just hoping to be able to customize the downloads separately from up-next. Thanks!
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Completely understand that, @dannyl9979. We have an open feature request similar to what you’re looking for, so I’ve made sure to add a vote for it on your behalf.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on how we can improve download management, especially in filters!
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