Druthers is in beta and run by one person. If something is wrong, telling me is genuinely useful — most of what's been fixed so far came from someone saying it felt off.
Getting it
- How do I install it?
- Through TestFlight, Apple's beta app. Open the invitation on your iPhone, install TestFlight if you don't have it, and Druthers installs from there. It is not on the App Store.
- What do I need?
- An iPhone running iOS 18 or later. There's no iPad or Mac version.
- Does it cost anything?
- No. No subscription, no paid tier, no ads.
Getting your shows in
- How do I add a podcast?
- Search for it by name, or paste a feed URL directly if you have one.
- I'm coming from another podcast app.
- Export an OPML file from your old app — nearly all of them can, usually under settings or account — then import it into Druthers. Your subscriptions come across in one go. Play positions and history don't: no app exports those.
- The import filled my queue with episodes I've already heard.
- When you import or subscribe, the app asks whether you're already caught up on that show. Say you are and its back catalogue is marked as heard, so it won't be suggested. You can also mark a whole show as played later from the show's own screen.
The queue
- Why is this episode in my queue?
- Each suggestion shows a short reason — favourited, fresh for that show, you finish these, and so on. Press and hold it for the actual numbers behind the decision.
- I don't want it suggesting anything.
- Turn autopilot off in Settings. It stops adding episodes; everything you put in the queue yourself stays exactly where it is, and playback is unaffected.
- An episode I'd started vanished.
- It shouldn't — once you're about half a minute into something it's held in the queue until you finish it or remove it, specifically so this can't happen. If one did disappear, that's a bug worth reporting, and it helps to say roughly how far in you were.
- One show is dominating the queue.
- Each episode taken from a show makes the next one from that show score lower, so this should settle on its own. If a show is genuinely crowding everything out, tell me which one and how often it publishes.
Your data
- Will my subscriptions move to a new phone?
- Not automatically — there's no sync between devices yet. Use Export backup in Settings, which writes a single file holding your subscriptions, queue and listening history, and restore it on the other device. Keep a copy somewhere safe.
- What happens if I delete the app?
- Everything goes with it — history, positions and downloads all live on the device. Export a backup first if you want any of it back.
- What do you collect about me?
- Nothing. The privacy page is the long version.
Reporting a bug
Email hello@getdruthers.com. The things that make a report immediately actionable:
- What you expected, and what happened instead.
- The show or episode it happened with, if it's specific to one.
- Whether it happens every time or just happened once.
- The build number, from the bottom of the Settings screen.
It's one person answering, so it may take a few days — but beta reports do get read.