Google will shut down its Podcasts app on this date

The Google Podcasts app is retiring, and starting Tuesday, April 2, 2024, users will no longer be able to listen to their favorite shows. The Podcasts app now displays a message when opening the app, emphasizing that the app will no longer function after the expiration date. Once the app is discontinued, users should export their subscriptions to access them. The tech giant is also promoting YouTube Music as an alternative space for listening to podcasts, and has even added a tool to easily export your subscriptions.

Opening the Google Podcasts app now displays a message that states: “After April 2, 2024, you will no longer be able to listen to podcasts on Google Podcasts. As an alternative, you can get podcasts, music, and more on the YouTube Music app .” The company’s first disclose The company plans to discontinue the app in September 2023, when it added the ability to watch and listen to YouTube Music podcasts in the United States in a blog post.

Although the Podcasts app has been downloaded more than 500 million times on the Android Play Store alone, Google cited data from Edison Research, a company that tracks podcast data, highlighting that about 23% of weekly podcast users in the United States prefer to listen to the show on YouTube Music on Google Podcasts is only 4%.

After the shutdown, users will not be able to play content on the Podcasts app, however, Google will give users a few more days to export their data and subscriptions to YouTube Music or another app of their choice. While the tech giant offers a tool to easily export subscriptions to YouTube Music, moving to other apps requires converting subscriptions to OPML files first. Alternatively, users can simply add podcasts manually using an RSS feed.

For those planning to switch to YouTube Music, Google has also created a support page Provides step-by-step guidance to make the transition easy. However, it should be noted that some podcasts may not be transferred using this process. If the podcast does not comply with YouTube’s community guidelines, it will not be automatically transferred.If this occurs, the user can access library > Select podcast > Click Add podcast > Select Add podcast via RSS feed.