The Best Podcast Manager for IPhone
IOS has a ton of great podcast managers right now, but after testing all of them, we like Overcast the most because it contains a ton of awesome features and remains free.
Overcast weather
Platform : iPhone / iPad / Internet Price : Free download page
Functions
- Streaming or downloading options
- Chapter support
- Various storage management options
- Smart Speed dynamically changes speed without distortion
- Custom playlists
- Additional push notifications
- Sleep timer
- Voice enhancement normalizes low quality recordings
- Optional sync with web app
- Discovery section for finding new podcasts
- Easily import from other podcast apps
- Apple Watch support
Where is it best
First things first; Overcast does everything a podcast manager should do. Managing podcasts is easy, creating playlists based on filters or manually is super easy, and it has tons of storage management options so you don’t waste a ton of storage space when you linger on podcasts. If you’re not a podcast downloader at all, Overcast lets you stream episodes instead of downloading them, which is great for people who don’t have a lot of extra storage on their device. If you tend to listen to podcasts on both your iOS device and computer, Overcast has a rudimentary web player that syncs with iOS apps. The web player doesn’t have super features, but it has everything you need.
Everything else is what really sets Overcast apart. The Smart Speed setting removes moments of silence and dead air from podcasts to reduce overall playback time without losing voice speed. In terms of overall speed, Overcast can speed up podcasts while still maintaining a fairly natural-sounding voice, which is a feat in itself. Plus, the Voice Boost feature normalizes the podcast volume, so even if the production level is poor, it still sounds great on your part.
Finally, Overcast has tons of settings so you can customize how you use the app. You can set up different time slots for forward and backward search, different gestures for the headphone remote controls (for example, two clicks to skip a podcast, three clicks to go back 30 seconds, or whatever), and limit the number of unheard episodes that are stored on your device based on podcast after podcast.
Where it fails
With Overcast, there really isn’t much to complain about. It has almost all the basic competition features, but it’s free. Anyway, the only complaint comes from a messed up web player, but considering it’s a free toss, it’s hard to whine too much.
Although Overcast is free, you can support the developer. In the app, you can choose to support Overcast by paying between $ 2.99 and $ 11.99. You are not required to do this, and it does not add any functionality. It is exclusively for those who like the app and want ongoing support. This is a great way to support the application, but it could mean that updates will be slightly slower from now on.
Competition
The podcast manager scene has gotten hotter over the years, and so you have tons of great options. One of our previous picks, Downcast ($ 2.99) continues to be one of the best podcast managers on iOS. It does almost everything that Overcast does, but is second only to design and usability. Downcast is a little clunky, visually cluttered and hard to get used to, but it has a Mac app that it syncs with if you’re a fan of listening on your computer. If you find Overcast isn’t for you, Downcast is a great alternative.
Likewise, another of our previous picks, Pocket Casts ($ 4.99), is also a good alternative. It does pretty much everything Downcast and Overcast does, but it’s cross-platform so it’s easy to switch between devices. It also has a great web player, so you can listen to music on your computer.
People who need to manage a small number of podcasts love Castro ($ 3.99). Castro has a great continuous playback option, tons of data management settings, sleep timer and gestures that make it easy to control while on the move. It’s not great for a ton of podcasts, but if you only listen to five or six, or just have a smaller iOS device, Castro is a great choice.
Also worth mentioning are Apple’s own podcasts (free). Podcasts sync your subscriptions to iTunes, so if you’re using it or an Apple TV, syncing is pretty straightforward. Podcasts aren’t nearly as full-featured as all of the above, but they do play podcasts just fine, and if you’re deep in the Apple ecosystem, there are benefits to using it on other devices.