Apple Podcasts Skip and Jump around

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.

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.

Happening regularly for the ‘Empire’ podcast. At first I thought it was an issue with podcast production. But the same podcast is perfectly clear on Spotify. Switched to Spotify and haven’t looked back.

Streamed audio is usually delivered in sequenced bundles to the player, which plays them - in sequence - to provide the illusion of continuous playback. My hunch is Apple introduced a bug in the sequencing logic, or the backend is delivering bundles out of sequence. It would be an interesting experiment to see if the issue repeats on downloaded episodes.

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.

This happened to me for months but I just deleted the app and reinstalled it. It seems to be working so far. Otherwise I just use Spotify.

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

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…

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.

Skipping issue occurring when using podcast on my Apple Watch ultra. Going on for over a year. Two contacts with apple support gave very temporary help - deleting the podcast app on my linked iPhone (14 pro max yada yada) and re-installing the app. I've added in double checking what is showing as played and changing ones I've listed to as played but this is a true PITA. skipping happens on the following: 1. if I get a phone call or text message announcement, podcast skips back near to the beginning; 2. if I'm out running especially in the rain becomes impossible to manage, skipping all over the place; 3. if I pause a podcast (this just happened right now, skipped it back to almost the beginning (why????); 4. if I try to fast forward it will sometimes skip back and forth, like an obstinate child..... Will try overcast. can't be worse, right?

Bump

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

iOS 16.1.1

13 Pro

This has been happening to me too, and not just on my Apple Podcast app but on my Spotify app too. It’s so bizarre. iPhone 13 Pro Max iOS 16.3.1

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.

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!!

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.