Apple Podcasts Skip and Jump around

Samesies. Just happened to me about 3 minutes ago for the 1000x. i was listening to a podcast on the podcast app and all of sudden I’m skipped back 30 minutes. The length of the skip varies and seems to have no pattern I can discern.

I’ve been dealing with this annoyance for probably a close to a year now, and it followed me when I made the switch from the iPhone 13 to The 14.

I hate the app, but won’t leave the platform since I’ve given it 6+ years of my tIme, and my listening history is invaluable to me. I’m of the belief that if I’m paying $1,000 for a product I would like it to function properly. That’s just me though…

Plain and simple this is stupid. I find it hard to believe there’s not a solution to this problem. I just haven’t figured out why Apple is slacking so hard on this one.

The struggle is real.

Hey, Apple...THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE! My 20 year old iPod works better than my new iPhone. Not only do podcasts randomly move backward and then forward, they now also skip entire chunks of content. While I appreciate the work arounds provided in the comments below, they are either untenable (what's the point of having a hands free device so that you may drive safely if you need to look at the device?), or just a flat out a P I A. I plan to use my husband's android phone for a bit to see if his works better. If so - bye bye Apple. You're no longer the only game in town.

PS. It happened to me several times just before typing this and again just now.

Bump.

VERY annoying. If I ever notice that it happens (mostly after pausing or backtracking), I pause the podcast, close down the app completely (swipe up), it then re-buffers, & then returns to normal. I could understand if it was streaming live with video, but this I uploaded audio to their servers that is streamed to our devices.

It feels like I'm using a janky version of RealPlayer (LOL showing my age) with no way to create a custom playlist.

Same!! It’s been happening recently on Apple, so I switched to Spotify and it’s happening there too! Must be an IOS thing then? I’m on 16.4.1 - this may have started for me when my IOS was updated last week; don’t recall it happening before then now that I think about it. Ughgh…

BUMP.

Been having this issue for a year now. Pretty close to dropping Apple Podcasts altogether - not because of the issue, but because it’s not being addressed.

Happened again as I type this. 🙄

Bump

same here, been happening for months. I’ve deleted the app, restarted the phone, and checked for iOS updates at more than one interval at this point and the problem comes back. It’s incredibly annoying.

Here’s a workaround that I use that’s faster than quitting and restarting (this assumes you have some podcasts queued up to play next):

1) For the current podcast (the one that is skipping), tap on the “…” and select “Play Next”.

2) Scroll down and swap the order of the top two in the queue.

3) Tap on the one that’s now top of the queue to start it playing.

4) Once it starts playing, scroll back up and again tap on the “…” and select “Play Next”.

5) Again, scroll down and swap the order of the top two in the queue. The podcast you were originally listening to should now be at the top.

6) Tap on it to start it playing. The skipping should be gone and the “next” queue should be back the way it was.

Observations:

For me, it primarily seems to happen if I’ve used the back up or fast forward buttons while listening. This seems to “confuse“ the podcast player.

This seems to primarily happen in podcasts with ad breaks.

I am having the same issue with my new iPhone 14 Pro! How is this new phone and technology skipping like my discman from 1993? It's crazy! Hoping there is a fix for this soon since it's quite annoying.

Bump

same thing happening to me, getting worse, multiple podcasts.

iOS 16.1.1

13 Pro

My issue is that I’m not done with a podcast, but I’m listening to it with CarPlay, park, shut the car off and next time I get back in the car, my iPhone 13 Pro Max thinks I finished the podcast and it’s moved on to something completely different.

Bump.

still happening on iOS 16.5 on my iPhone 14 Pro Max

yes me too! it’s incredibly frustrating, i started using pocket casts but they don’t work on desktop and spotify has a varied selection of shows and I just can’t keep track of anything any more. Hey Apple!! Please fix this!!

All of a sudden it’s not just Apple podcast it’s Spotify also. I jumped from one to the other and it was happening on both so I think it’s the system. And I’m an old lady so I’m not sure if that means iOS or the phone… Whatever technical term you brilliant youngsters know right off the top of your head.

I was experiencing this same issue with my iPhone 14, and I even switched from cheap Bluetooth earpods to official Apple Airpods Pro to no avail.

I finally realized that because the Now Playing app on my Apple Watch was set to auto start, when working it was quite easy for me to touch or bump my watch and trigger the various skipping options. I turned this off under Settings->General->Auto-Launch and have not had it occur again.

I know this is an old post, but maybe this helps someone else.

Gonna try and take audio controls off Lock Screen. I’m thinking that may be the issue here.