After beta testing, Pocket Casts is rolling out a handful of updates on Android, including new widgets and a redesign of the homescreen.
Pocket Casts started testing three new homescreen widgets back in April, but pulled and redesigned them to address user feedback about the unnecessarily squished playback controls.
A new 1×1 “Small Player” widget shows the artwork of your current podcast with a play/pause button at the center.
The “Medium Player” comes in 3×1, 4×1, or 5×1. Cover art is followed by skip back, play/pause, and skip forward. Those buttons are placed in rounded rectangular containers. Overall, it’s similar to the original translucent widget, which remains available today as “Medium Player (Classic).”
Finally, the “Large Player” adds the episode name and duration to the controls section at the top. This is followed by your Up Next queue, which can be expanded to take up the entire homescreen. Dynamic Color (in Settings > Appearance) themes the background and buttons to match a device’s wallpaper. If disabled, a light/dark widget background is leveraged instead.
Opening the app, “Up Next” is now part of the bottom bar to provide more immediate access to your queue of episodes. It appears between the tabs for “Podcasts” and “Filters,” with “Discover” and “Profile” rounding out core navigation.
The miniplayer is no longer docked to that bottom bar. It floats and features rounded corners in a subtle modernization.
Lastly, you’ll notice that the podcast grid has been refreshed. Artwork is no longer edge-to-edge with the new episode corner badge also updated.
Old vs. new
Version 7.64 of Pocket Casts for Android with the new widgets and homescreen redesign is now rolling out to stable via the Play Store.
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