Podcasts app not deleting played episodes that are synced from iTunes (others delete fine)

Hi Jeremy,

Thanks for trying to solve my problem. Unfortunately it didn't help, since I can't locate the podcasts in question on my device using that method (i.e. hooking up with a USB cable, using iTunes to go click on my iphone's name and then going to "Podcasts" under "On My Device"). That method shows that I only have 25 podcasts on my device, all of which I have not yet listened to. Looking at my actual device, I see many (many many) more podcasts that I have already listened to (and which have a "plus" by them, as seen in the attached screenshot I posted in my last comment in this thread), none of which show up through iTunes.

There is something else interesting going on with looking at my device through iTunes, though. Have a look at the attached screenshot on this message (below). You will see that some of the podcasts that do show up through iTunes have dotted circles next to them. Those podcasts are ones I can't seem to either listen to or delete through iTunes. But some of them have blue dots next to them. Those I can either listen to or delete.

This seems to be a completely separate problem from the one I asked about in my first message in this thread (which I am still having), but perhaps it is related?

Thank you for any help you can provide.

Jennie

Here's an update that might be of use to anyone out there who would be interested in helping me solve this issue.

I went into iTunes and turned the download function there to manual. Since then, episodes have only been downloading via my phone and so I'm no longer getting the duplicate episodes there (with some of them downloaded directly and others transferred from my laptop via USB cable). So that's good. But the episodes that transferred to my phone from my laptop between September 25th and November 2nd (see the below screenshot for some of the older examples) are still appearing in my episodes list despite having been listened to and having a "plus" after them. I still need help getting rid of these episodes, so anyone who's willing to help, I'd appreciate it.

Thanks for this contribution, reuben_m. Indeed, your experience sounds almost identical to mine, and I'm particularly struck by you saying that it used to be that syncing would remove the episodes from the iPhone, but that no longer happens since iOS 13.

I tried your workaround, and it didn't work quite like you described for me. Instead what happened is that I touched the "+" and got it to change to a download icon, then clicked the download icon and downloaded the podcasts again, and then the podcasts were still on my phone minus the plus sign. BUT if I fast-forwarded through the podcasts again and let them "finish playing", they were THEN marked as played. So your workaround ended up getting the episodes off my phone too. Thank you!