Google Podcasts on the web adds homepage, search, and suggestions

Abner Li | Feb 6 2020 - 11:33 am PT

Since last March, there’s been a roundabout way to access Google Podcasts online with episode playback positions from your phone and Assistant devices synced. Google Podcasts on the web now has a homepage with search and recommendations.

Previously, you could only access the show page for a podcast online, with Google primarily wanting users to discover via Search. There is now a homepage when you visit podcasts.google.com that surfaces show suggestions like “Top” and “Trending” for various categories.

Tapping on cover art will show the same list of episodes. This is much more convenient than having to be manually aware of the long URL.

More powerful is the ability to search Google Podcasts with a field at the top of the screen. Similar to the Android client, the top result displays a card, while “Episode Results” and “Show results” appear below. Each listing includes cover art, description, and play button that pops up the bottom docked player.

The site is completely responsive and works nicely on mobile. It’s particularly ideal for iPhones and iPads where Google does not have a native experience. However, the site today does not list your subscriptions, so it’s not a true desktop equivalent. That said, playback positions are still synced and you can manually visit shows you listen to.

This Google Podcasts web homepage is widely available today. It comes as the Android client has seen a number of visual tweaks in recent releases, including a Material Theme player. Meanwhile, we’ve enabled an upcoming redesign that features a bottom bar and built-in queue.