opencast: podcast player

opencast finds the ad breaks in your podcasts and skips them.

It is also yours. There is no opencast account, no tracking SDK, and no ads of our own. Subscriptions and listening progress sync through your private iCloud, any RSS feed works, and the source code is MIT-licensed on GitHub.

Transcripts are made on your device with Apple Speech or Whisper. Follow along as the episode plays and tap any line to jump there. Search everything said in the episodes you've transcribed. Generate chapters and a summary for any transcribed episode. Voice Boost is a broadcast-style leveler for quiet hosts and loud rooms.

~how ad skipping works~
Tap Detect Ads on an episode, or turn on automatic detection for a show, and your phone transcribes it. opencast checks the transcript for promo and sponsor reads and marks every break on the timeline and in the transcript. High-confidence breaks skip automatically. Borderline sponsor reads are marked but never skipped, so you decide. Queue a batch, keep listening, and get one notification when detection finishes. Detection works from the transcript text, not the audio.

~what the app can do for you~
• Skips ad breaks automatically, with one-tap undo
• Transcripts on device, with tap-to-seek and follow-along highlighting
• Full-text search across titles, notes, and transcripts in your library
• Generated chapters and summaries for episodes with a transcript
• Voice Boost, speed, sleep timer, AirPlay, and Up Next
• Per-show intro and outro skip
• CarPlay and Siri integration
• New-episode notifications with no promotions inside
• Search the podcast directory or subscribe by RSS URL
• OPML import and export
• Downloads for offline listening
• Private iCloud sync for subscriptions and progress
• Native SwiftUI for iOS 27, on iPhone and iPad

~optional and paid~
On-device transcription and ad skipping are free. Remote Transcription, cloud ad detection, and Chapters & Summary are optional and use transcription hours: the first hour is free, then 20 hours for $0.99 or 100 hours for $4.99, in the US. Remote Transcription and cloud ad detection process episode audio only for the jobs you request. Chapters & Summary sends transcript text, never audio. You see the estimate before a Remote Transcription or Chapters & Summary job starts. Remote transcription and summaries are offered at-cost.

opencast is open source under the MIT license:
https://github.com/connlark/opencast

Your listening is not a growth funnel.