iOS 16.4 keeps deleting my unplayed downloaded Podcast.

iOS 16.5 is now available to install. I notice I can still crash the Podcasts app by swiping up on the episode page (whatever it's called, when you click on an episode to play and then click on the episode that appears at the bottom to read more details about it like the description). But previously that would trigger the deletion of the episodes, that doesn't seem to be the case now. Time will tell if they remain undeleted, since that would also happen randomly for me within a day or two of syncing.

But I'm hopeful that this bug was finally fixed!

i Just installed the official release of 16.5.

Will try syncing some podcasts from iTunes over the weekend hoping that this issue has finally been resolved and the synced podcasts do not get deleted by the iPhone.

Fingers crossed!

No deletion events since I installed the update three days ago on the 18th.

As another test, I rebooted my phone -- Podcasts still there.

I crashed the app by swiping up on the episode screen (see my previous posts for what this means) - Podcasts still there.

Don't want to jinx it, but so far so good.

I have this same problem on iOS 16.6.1, which I updated to two weeks ago (previously I was on iOS 15, which worked fine). Podcasts will even auto-delete while they're playing: the currently-playing podcast will have a "Remove podcast" option when I hit the ellipsis menu item, then two minutes later that will have changed to "Download podcast", and presumably I'm now streaming it. If I then download, it will do so, while continuing to play, but when I look a couple minutes later it once again has a "Download podcast" option.

I've still got 176GB free on the phone, and I've never enabled "optimized storage" or "Remove Played Podcasts". This all started, AFAICT, as soon as I updated to iOS 16; everything's been working fine for years prior, and nothing else has changed except the OS.

I realize it's been a year since this thread petered out, and I'm surprised to find it hasn't been locked. However, I'm posting out of a sense of curiosity. FWIW, I updated through 16.6.1 and while the self-deleting podcasts was fixed with the 16.5 update, NONE of the other many issues I listed earlier in this thread have been addressed. I haven't updated to any of the 17.x releases (as of this writing, current is 17.4.1) for various technical reasons, but I'm not aware that any of the problems with the Podcasts app have been addressed in any of the 17.x releases. What are you folks finding? Has Podcasts improved much during the v17 lifecycle? Is it worth revisiting? I tried looking for an alternate application, but I couldn't seem to find anything that would catch, store, and sync podcasts between local storage on my iMac, and my iPhone--everything seemed to want me to use "the cloud" or to pay a subscription service.

I have since removed the Podcasts app from my iPhone and my iMac. For a podcatcher, I have installed iTunes 12.9.5.5 on an old iMac running 10.14.6 Mojave, where it merrily runs and downloads my subscribed podcasts to a directory on my home network server. To play the podcasts, I use the Files app on my iPhone to browse to the directory on my home server and then play them from there. When I'm away from home, I first establish a VPN connection to my home server, and then browse with Files. I use the colored tags in the OS to mark which files I've listened to. It isn't perfect, but it's much less painful that the hot mess that is the Podcasts app.

Curious to hear others' experiences.

This is my exact issues as well. Have to note where I left off so I can start back in the correct spot the next day.

Fortunately, 16.5 fixed the problem :-)

Has iOS 16.5 been released or are you on a Beta/RC version?

My latest update a couple of days ago loaded 16.5 bits that appear to be fully released.