How do podcasts on Patreon work?

April 28, 2022 1:22 PM

I keep hearing podcasts push their Patreon subscriptions where they have ad free versions. I hate ads and would like to throw five bucks to people! But I also only listen to podcasts through my phone, never through a computer. I haven’t been able to turn up an answer about how listening to a podcast through Patreon works if you are using a phone. Can anyone shed some light on this?
posted by Bottlecap to Technology (10 answers total)

Best answer: They just give you a URL with a code in it. You add that to whatever podcast player you usually use. Then it's the same as any other podcast.
posted by bowbeacon at 1:23 PM on April 28, 2022 [6 favorites]

Best answer: When you subscribe to a Patreon podcast, they give you a private RSS feed link, that you would enter into your podcast player. Without knowing your particular podcast app, I cant really instruct further than that, but it’s generally really simple.
posted by General Malaise at 1:23 PM on April 28, 2022 [3 favorites]

Response by poster: Oh! Well that’s pretty straightforward. Thank you!
posted by Bottlecap at 1:29 PM on April 28, 2022

I will state that this doesn't work if you use Stitcher. I end up just going to Patreon on my phone and loading the post, then playing it from there.
posted by fiercecupcake at 1:31 PM on April 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

Just to give exact instructions for one example case from someone who does this all the time:

I go to the Patreon Website on my phone and go the page for the podcast that I've subscribed to. I go to the "My membership" tab and scroll down to the "Private RSS link" box. I hit "Copy RSS link" then I go to Overcast (my podcast app of choice). In Overcast I tap the "+" in the upper right corner and then tap "Add URL", also in the upper right corner. That takes me to a page that has a box where I paste the RSS link and hit "done".

Then the podcast is added to my list just like any public podcast would be.
posted by firechicago at 1:40 PM on April 28, 2022 [3 favorites]

If you use PocketCasts, you can paste the URL directly into the "Search Podcasts" bar in the Discover tab.
posted by CheeseLouise at 2:02 PM on April 28, 2022 [4 favorites]

You can also listen directly in the patreon app for at least some of them, though their player isn't great.
posted by knapah at 2:09 PM on April 28, 2022

I listen on the Patreon app for the most part; it's improved and generally works fine. (It's improved in the last couple years.) If you're listening to older stuff the search through the feed to find a specific episode is probably the worst part.
posted by mark k at 5:15 PM on April 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

If you're on an iPhone, Overcast (as well as being a terrific podcast player generally) supports this well.
posted by Happy Dave at 2:31 AM on April 29, 2022

I use Overcast and have added the RSS feed from Patreon. I was under the impression you only have to do that once to get all of the episodes ad-free but this hasn’t been the case. I still get ads.
posted by waving at 6:21 AM on April 29, 2022