Player FM goes native on Android with a podcast app worth checking out

When Player FM debuted its podcast listening and discovery platform on the web last May, I said that it made podcasts look cool again.

A year later, Player FM is back with a native Android app, it’s definitely worth taking a look as well: The app features a very eye-pleasing, Google-like design, complete with cards that we’ve come to know from apps like Google Now and the latest version of the Play store.

But Player FM isn’t just about looks: What sets the app apart from other podcasting applications is its emphasis on discovery. Player FM lets you not only subscribe to your favorite podcasts, but also to topics. These topics can be broad, like technology and international news, or very specific, like Pixar or Ruby on Rails. Each of these topics surfaces episodes from a number of relevant podcasts, which is great to discover new favorites and get different perspectives on a certain topic.

Your own podcast subscriptions are accessible through a separate tab, and also synced with the Player FM website, where others can use them as a starting point for their own podcast listening. Of course, there are also a bunch of features you’d expect from a podcasting app, including the ability to download episodes for offline listening, complete with options to restrict downloads to WiFi or even to times when the device is plugged in for charging.

There are some features still missing from the app, including playback status sync between different devices as well as the app and the website. You also can’t find podcasts by title through the app yet, but Player FM creator Michael Mahemoff told me that this feature is coming soon. In the meantime, users can go to the web app to fine tune their subscriptions, and then listen to them on the go.

Check out a few screenshots of the Player.fm Android app below: