Pocket Casts is being penalized for serving ads to older users who were promised an ad-free experience.
Reports of the ads first started appearing in early September on the Pocket Casts support forum and subreddit. The problem stems from a bug, according to Matt Mullenweg, CEO of parent company Automattic.
Pocket Casts launched in 2010 as an in-app purchase , charging users a one-time “download fee” of up to $10, depending on the operating system and platform. The service later switched to a subscription model and made the app available for free in 2019. The changes sparked backlash among early users who had paid for the web or desktop apps. The company was forced to offer them free lifetime access to Pocket Casts Plus , its premium , ad-free subscription service .
See also: Samsung brings ads to US Family Hub refrigerators
The app was acquired by Automattic in 2021, and Pocket Casts Lifetime subscriptions were renamed “Pocket Casts Champion” in August 2024. A support page stated that the renaming would not change anything about users’ subscription, and there was no mention of the introduction of ads. However, some users of these free lifetime subscriptions are now seeing ads and are being asked to pay the $40 annual fee for Plus to remove them.
Pocket Casts: User reactions to the ads
“I just want the ads to go away – I don’t need the other features of Plus yet,” said one user on the Pocket Casts forum. “This change makes me feel like you’re trying to increase your conversion rate by making the base product worse.”
In the same forum post, a Pocket Casts employee stated that the only way to remove the banner ads is for users to pay for a Plus subscription, and that the ads were introduced to “ support the ongoing work and maintenance of the app .” This contradicts a statement from Mullenweg , who claims that ads appearing on lifetime accounts member are a bug and that the company is working to fix it .
See also: Phishing campaign targets hoteliers through malicious ads
“ Anyone who has paid for Pocket Casts, even before the Automattic acquisition, should not see ads ,” Mullenweg said in a Hacker News thread . “ I don’t believe in ‘lifetime’ purchases, and we don’t create new ones at Automattic, but we have honored long-time users who paid a one-time fee to Pocket Casts with what we call a ‘Champions’ account, which is a lifetime agreement that you will get the best of what we sell .”
There are only a few thousand lifetime members of Pocket Casts, according to Mullenweg, who added that “it seemed better to try to make it a gift than to try to move people into what is really a viable business model.”
It remains to be seen whether this is indeed a bug and if it will be addressed soon. Users complain that the ads significantly undermine the user experience.
The case highlights the difficult balance between business viability and maintaining the trust of loyal users, especially in apps with a strong base of long-time subscribers. Pocket Casts remains popular, but the management of advertising for Champion members could be a critical test of its reputation and the loyalty of the podcasting community.
See also: Meta: Removes political ads from platforms in the EU
Pocket Casts' next move will determine whether it can reconcile its revenue needs with its obligation to be transparent and respectful to its lifelong users, while maintaining the trust it had built since its startup days.
