Playback skips backwards randomly
-
About half way through a podcast, the audio playback will skip backwards about 1 minute. It started as only happening once an episode but got to the point where it can happen 5 or more times. I usually listen to downloaded episodes so I tried listening via stream and it still happened but with only one or two skips an episode. The skips are seamless so I don’t think it’s a buffering problem.
app is version 7.52. Running android 14 on Galaxy s22 ultra.
-
We’ve rolled out an update for the Android app, addressing bugs and enhancing performance. Make sure you’ve upgraded to version 7.53 on the Play Store, if you haven’t already.
-
This happens to me all the time and it’s been happening for over a year. I’m finally getting frustrated enough with it to write it because now it will do it five or six times during a 2 hour episode, downloaded or not and all different kinds of podcasts. I am on iOS (currently 17.2.1) and am running the latest Pocketcasts (7.5.3.1).
Seems like this is an ongoing issue on both platforms:
https://forums.pocketcasts.com/forums/topic/playback-skips-back-and-i-miss-the-end-of-the-episode/
-
Yes, we’ve been actively addressing this issue for some time now. We’ve observed that episodes with dynamic ads tend to encounter this problem. This happens because the ads change every time you stream the episode, and each ad varies in length.
Our usual recommendation to circumvent this issue is to download the episodes from the affected podcasts, which stops the ads from constantly changing.
However, @8v6jh5kmfw, it seems like you’re experiencing this issue even with downloaded episodes. Could you please confirm this?
-
I confirm the problem happens on downloaded episodes. I primarily listen on downloaded episodes so that is where I mostly experience the problem.
-
Dynamic ads makes a ton of sense based on the podcasts that are the most affected by this (Spotify/Ringer podcasts).
I’m not as confident that it happens with downloaded episodes as @johngrillo4 is, but I think I’ve experienced it in that case as well. I will play closer attention in the coming days and report back.
-
@8v6jh5kmfw since you’re on iOS, the underlying cause of your particular issue may well be a different one from @johngrillo4’s, despite the “symptoms” looking the same. In any case, if you experience the issue again, can you share the episode you experienced the issue with so we can try to replicate the skip?
From a podcast’s page, you can click on the episode to expand its details, then click on the Share icon in the upper-right corner of the screen, copy the link, and paste it here.
-
I’ve been experiencing this issue for quite some time as well.
One of the main podcasts I see this issue with is “Around the NFL” which I believe has dynamic ads. The episodes can be long and it seems to happen at least once an episode. When I’ve tried to replicate on my PC at similar timestamps, I usually can’t replicate it and thus haven’t reported it, but it is starting to become too irritating to ignore. I notice it most in the Android Auto app in my car, but have heard it on desktop and mobile as well (web app and Android respectively).
One issue that’s fresh in my mind happened around the 1h26m mark in this episode from Android Auto, but I believe there was an earlier issue in the episode as well:
https://pca.st/zmv8js10 -
Thanks for sharing that, @thomasjwhitee51821f61c
We’re looking into this issue and hope to have a solution soon. As a workaround, could you try downloading episodes from these affected podcasts? That should ensure the duration does not change. If the duration is the same, then the skipping issue should stop occurring.
-
I have a question. Why other apps doesn’t have this problem? I found this problem only on Pocket Casts..
-
This has been happening for months, and is unfortunately pretty close to driving me away from the app and my subscription to it.
Episodes are often so confusing they’re barely coherent, with all the skipping. I am on iOS, and it happens on multiple podcasts, including Pivot, and Working It Out.
-
this is still very much an issue. It has not been fixed. I’m currently on IOS. It’s getting so frustrating that I’m real close to deleting the app entirely and going back to the regular Apple podcast app. You guys NEED TO FIX THIS! It’s been an ongoing problem for way too long now. I’m currently listening to “Monsters Among Us” podcast and it has now skipped back and forward at least 4 times. You’ve isolated that the problem has to do with the way you insert ads, so FIX IT
-
as the person above my previous post stated, it happens on multiple podcasts, and it happens enough that it makes the episodes extremely hard to follow because often it does it in mid sentence so that you don’t even catch it at first until you realize you are hearing the exact same words again, or that what they are talking about suddenly makes zero sense.
this is no way to listen to podcasts. It becomes more and more aggravating by the day. I stopped using Apple podcast app because it kept freezing, which is why I came here, but at this point I’m about ready to take freezing over content random time skips. At least when Apple podcast app worked, it worked correctly and played the entire cast
HINT: if dynamically inserted ads are causing the problem, then DISABLE DYNAMICALLY INSERTED ADS UNTIL YOU CAN FIX THIS. Just expecting us to live with it, while still allowing the ads to screw up our listening experience is not okay. And expecting us to just download every episode is also not okay. FIX THIS
-
I’ve been using pocket casts since June 2017 – almost 7 years. I have 158 days of listening under my belt. If you don’t fix this problem I’m going to move to Spotify. It’s that simple guys, it’s making your app unusable.
-
I’m in the same situation. If you don’t solve the problem, I’ll go away. Please fix this problem immediately, don’t ditch Pocket Casts project.. it’s the best podcast app existent nowadays
-
-
Dynamic Ads are coming from the author of the podcasts, we have no control over that at all. You can consider chatting to the podcast author if you’re finding it a problem :)
-
Hi there, @shadowm81, @53jl, @nwhdkk6b7t & @7gywhng7k6!
Our team is hard at work to improve this. We hope to have some improvements out in an upcoming update.
-
When we’ll have update? Have you found the problem? I don’t understand why other apps (Spotify, overcast, Apple podcast and other) doesn’t have this problem and pocket casts yes..
-
Pocket Casts Forum 