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Castro Podcast Player gains Apple Watch streaming for iPhone free playback

Popular podcast player Castro is out today with a great update with the headlining feature of Watch Streaming. Watch Sync is also new which loads your favorite podcasts on your Apple Watch both automatically and with a manual option to give customers several ways to listen even when away from iPhone.

Watch Streaming and Watch Sync for Castro Podcast Player debuted today with version 2019.14 in the App Store.

Streaming gives Apple Watch users total freedom to listen to podcasts away from iPhone without having to worry whether episodes have been downloaded.

For the Watch Sync feature, podcasts will download with Castro when Apple Watch is on WiFi and doesn’t have to be on the charger. However, the developers note that they will sync faster when charging.

Castro Podcast Player is a free download from the App Store with Castro Plus unlocking all features from $2.99/month.

Check out all of the new features and changes in the full release notes:

WATCH SYNC IS HERE
All your favorite podcasts on your wrist.

Watch sync frees you up to listen completely untethered from your iPhone. Whether you’re out on a run, your kids have your phone during a road trip, or you just want to go phoneless for a while to minimise distractions, Castro’s Watch Sync has your favorite shows ready to listen.

QUEUE AUTO SYNC
The magic of Castro is in the queue, a wonderful place to set your listening on autopilot without clogging your phone with unwanted downloads. With Queue Auto Sync, Castro mirrors your listening between devices and automatically has what’s next ready to listen whenever you need it. You can limit synced episodes to the next 10, 20, or 30 in your Queue.

Episodes will sync to your watch when you’re on wifi, and will sync fastest when your watch is charging. You can kick off syncing any time from Settings > Watch Sync > Sync to Watch Now

SEND TO WATCH
See an episode in your queue you’d like to take with you? Any downloaded episode that isn’t already on your watch will have a Send to Watch button at the ready.

WATCH STREAMING
Not into syncing? Castro can now stream episodes in your queue straight from the watch over wifi or cellular.

PLAYBACK SPEED
Whether you’re listening on your phone or from your watch you can now control playback speed from the watch app. Neat.

GET IT NOW
Castro Plus subscribers running iOS 13 and watchOS 6 can get Watch Sync by downloading this update and turning on Watch Sync in Settings. Enjoy!

OTHER CHANGES

  • Support for the following watch face complications: “Graphic Bezel”, “Graphic Circular”, “Graphic Corner”
  • New haptic feedback when dragging and dropping episodes
  • Fixed a bug with rearranging episodes in the queue on iOS 13.2
  • Fixed a few different crashes that could happen when restoring from a backup
  • CarPlay should resume properly after using Siri now
  • Castro Plus pitch screen now includes a slide about hiding promoted content
  • Promoted posts in discovery shouldn’t swap out unexpectedly any more
  • Fresh App Store installs shouldn’t need “Restore Purchases” any more if Castro Plus subscription is still valid
  • Fix for sending logs to support to help with debugging issues
  • Text in discovery features now supports italic and bold formatting, how very 1990s of us (blinking text is as of yet unsupported)

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