Issues Syncing Across Devices
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I use Pocket Casts across several devices, my iPhone, my car running google os, and my Sonos home speakers.
My typical use case is to listen to a podcast in my car after I drop the kids off at school, get out of the car and then either walk the dog or go on the treadmill and listen on my iPhone, and then when I sit down at work, I put on my Sonos … All of which are logged in to the same account.When I read the info on syncing, it says that I should be able to pick up where I left off on each device, and if i star or archive content it should sync.
The latter part is mostly true, however the former about ppicking up where i left off is not working as expected. Typically if I go from car to iPhone, even after 10-15 mins of doing other things, the iPhone all will start where I initially started listening when i began in the car, perhaps a little later. It is almost as though the devices do not “phone” home often enough with bookmark or time points.
I even do forced refreshes at times, where I can, (I am unable to do so on the Sonos.)
Does anyone else have similar issues? or ways to resolve?
Thanks in advance
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Sorry, meant to add that all of my devices are running the latest OS versions and app versions.
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Hi @andy120118! 👋
If I understand correctly, it appears that your listening progress in the car wasn’t synced to the iPhone. Is that right?
You mentioned your car is running Google OS, can you please clarify if it is Android Auto or Android Automotive?
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It is Android Automotive.
And the lack of syncing support goes both directions. When I listen first in the car, it doesn’t seem to sync properly to my iPhone, and vice versa.
This morning I listened in the car after I dropped my son at school — I got 8:65 into a podcast. When I opened my iPhone it showed that I only listened for 6:05.
Is this normal, perhaps the sync points are not sent frequently enough?
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Thanks for confirming that you’re using Android Automotive, @andy120118!
Is this normal, perhaps the sync points are not sent frequently enough?
I’m still checking if we have any known sync issues with Android Automotive. In the meantime, however, when you spot any sync discrepancies, can you please go to the Android Automotive Settings and click on the “Refresh now” button at the bottom of the page? That should give the sync a nudge. Then, please let us know if that works!
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i listened to most of a podcast this morning – got out of car with 1:05 remaining. When I looked at the settings screen it showed “last refresh: 14 mins ago” which aligns with when I launched the PocketCasts app in the car and started listening.
Upon getting into my house I launched the PocketCasts app on my iPhone and the app showed that I had 1:55 remaining in the podcast.
This is not that bad as it was ~1 minute off.
Does that indicate that the Android Automotive app is syncing points outside of the “refresh” and the refresh is more for getting updates from the cloud?
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Does that indicate that the Android Automotive app is syncing points outside of the “refresh” and the refresh is more for getting updates from the cloud?
The “refresh” pertains to sending/getting updates from the server.
To be sure too, did you get to try manually refreshing the Android Automotive app with the “Refresh now” button before launching the app on your iPhone?
In addition, our developers would like to turn on server logging for your account to help investigate this issue further. If you’re okay with that, can you confirm if the email address you used here in the forums is the same one you use for your Pocket Casts account?
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Having syncing issues recently as well.
Folders and orders are not syncing across devices.
iOS.
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Hi @bradmatthews,
Regarding the issues you’re facing with your Folders, can you check if both devices are synced and connected to the same account? You can check this by going to Pocket Casts > Profile > Refresh Now, then clicking that button to force the device to sync the latest data.
If doing that isn’t fixing the issue, can you try restarting the app, and then rechecking?
That said, the layout (list/grid) set on the ‘Podcasts’ page is limited to each device and does not sync between devices.
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Hi
I’ve recently switched to Pocket Cast but I’m having the same non synching issues as described above. Despite manual refreshing both in the car, a new 2024 model (Android Automotive) and on my Android Pixel Pro 8, I’m having no joy. As the thread above was about a year ago, I wonder if there is a resolution by now? -
@jayennbee Can you share any further details about what’s not syncing between Android Automotive and your Android device? We’d be happy to further investigate with you.
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Me too. Syncing is not good. I think this fretting over what version of Android is not to the point: The syncing is not done by Android, it’s done by the PocketCasts app. If the syncing is faulty (and it is!) then this is an issue with the PocketCasts app.
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@pbeardsell We’d love any specifics you can share about the devices you’re using, the versions you have for Pocket Casts and OS and the specifics that aren’t syncing. We’re always making improvements, so this information is vital to helping us pin down exactly where the issue is.
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I have iOS 17.6.1 running on an iPhone 15 Pro Max. I also have a Pixel 7 running Android 14. I have been using iOS as my primary listening device. Both devices are signed into exactly the same account. I forced a refresh on iPhone and then a refresh on Android. On Android, I have thousands of episodes that are not marked as played or archived that have already been listened to and archived on iOS. The current episode that I am playing successfully synced but the filter lists don’t match up at all. Examining some of the 99 podcasts that I am subscribed to has unplayed episodes going back years that I have already listened to on iOS. Forcing a refresh on each device finishes in about a second implying that the played and archived status of each episode is not being sent to the server from iOS or not being pulled from the server for Android.
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@staff-frank on both devices played episodes: after playing, inactive episodes: never, include starred episodes: disabled.
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@kg6sxy Can you please confirm the Pocket Casts app version on both your iPhone and Pixel 7?
Also, after reinstalling Pocket Casts on your Android device, and signing in to your account, do you mean you’re still seeing the actual episodes in the Podcast pages not marked as played/archived?
Or, is it just that what you’re seeing in the Filters that didn’t sync?
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@staff-fred
On Android: 7.71 (9264)
On iOS: 7.71 (7.71.0.5)
Individual podcasts in the first tab are out of sync in addition to the filters. On Android, unplayed episodes go back to what appears to be the earliest episodes ever published.
Last refresh shows 0 seconds ago after forcing a refresh on both.
Up next does get synced but this still means that modifying up next on Android would take a significantly higher amount of effort once that queue has completed.
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@kg6sxy Based on what you’ve shared so far, it’s highly likely that you had been logged out of your sync account on the iPhone for quite some time. While logged out, any changes you’ve made to the app would not have been synced back to an account. In this case, I’d recommend that you try the steps here: https://support.pocketcasts.com/knowledge-base/sync-troubleshooting/#htoc-fixing-sync-issues-with-episode-statuses
Pocket Casts Forum 