Leave a Review Overcast
The only podcast app I love
I’ve been using this app since 2014 - first as a teenager, now as an adult. It’s very, very good. Like password managers, I try all the different options every now and then. And like 1Password, I keep landing back on Overcast, because it’s just that good.
There’s a few usability nitpicks here and there. The playlist interaction model isn’t very intuitive, and the podcast description is beneath the podcast chapters (to me, chapters would make more sense to have below the image, scrolling to get to them, or maybe expanding something?).
The fact that *that’s* the kind of thing that I take issue with says a lot more about the excellent state of the rest of this product. You can tell how much thought and care went into every corner of it.Show lessRobert Clover
2 steps forward, 1 step back
My previous review after the big update is below, but I’ve added another star now because several of the key features have been reinstated, albeit in less user-friendly ways than the original version. Unfortunately now new problems are popping up, most notably that the app just randomly crashes and completely closes itself out in the middle of podcasts. When I reopen the app I have to re-find the episode I was on and figure out and fast forward to wherever I was when it crashed. On top of that, this app is suddenly massively draining my phone’s battery incredibly fast, so I can’t even listen to podcasts if I won’t be able to charge my phone right afterwards.
……….
This was my favorite podcast app by far until the update took the features that were most important and useful to me and either removed them or made them significantly harder to use. It’s very clunky and unintuitive now and much harder to navigate. Plus most of the changes just flat out make it less functional — The worst ones are that the link to navigate back to the podcast from the individual episode is gone, and the “play next” feature is gone. Sleep timer is less flexible and harder to navigate. And everything takes more tapping to access, whereas it used to be easy to swipe and access a lot of features.Show lessJeb0114
Huge time saver, great iPhone and iPad versions
I really like Overcast would never switch to another podcast app, my main reason is the massive time saving that comes with the “smart speed” function that simply “shortens silences” as the UI aptly tells you. But there are many other reasons why I love this app:
The developer clearly takes a lot of care not only planning his app overall and its features, but also closely monitors usage and user feedback.
His complete rewrite of his app using Swift originally got a lot of, er, constructive criticism, mainly about the streaming function having been removed. He brought it back, even though it meant a lot of additional coding in the new system and a lot of server overhead and other complications. Streaming means that you can start playing a podcast immediately before the episode has downloaded fully. It makes a huge difference to me.
Also: With the Swift rewrite, the iPad version now is absolutely gorgous and I can see myself starting to use it regularly when listening at home.
Overcast is the app I recomend to those who listen to podcasts a lot. Casual podcast users might as well stick to Apple’s basic app, but you will quickly find it indispensable if you are a regular podcast listener.Show lessA publisher and programmer