Audiobook and Podcast Player App Reviews

Great App! Really enjoy listening to books. One question, the apps image has evaporated on my iTouch 3 and iTouch 4. Now there is a blank white square. Is this fixable? Still works great.

Awesome app. Very detailed and full of features found nowhere else. Even a dead mans switch to make it pause when you fall asleep. How clever! Wish: load all parts of a book at one rather than individually.

The adjustable reading speed for audiobooks works great for studying, especially when you need to slow something down to take notes

Whatever the developer did regarding DRM files made it so that the player no longer displays the chapter list for DRM protected files.

annoyed that i paid for this. My frustration was with the stock media player that always reset or didnt remember where i was with audfiobooks when i switched to music so i bought this app since it is supposed to remember where you were. It doesnt and sometimes resets itself to random spots in the story. So basically i spent money for an app that doesnt actually do what it is supposed to. I do wonder if this is something to do with bluetooth effects though

#1 problem solved, 5 stars just for that. Requests: Beautified UI iPad app

The reliability is the issue - if creators were not able to do practical UI, they at least could make it not jamp back randomly, many they ?..

My main requirement was an audiobook player with adjustable playback speed over 2X. That requirement was totally met as you can adjust playback in increments all the way up to 4X. Increments are in tenths so you can really fine tune a playback speed you are comfortable with. I have had problems with other apps of not bookmarking correctly so that it looses your place in the book, no problem here in that regard.. So based on that alone I am happy with this app and will continue using it since I listen to a lot of audiobooks and have particular requirements. Now as to the reason this is not a five star rating. 1. There is only one way to get content into the app, synching it to iTunes. No option for Dropbox or other forms of synching wirelessly and you can’t even upload to the app directly via iTunes. 2. The UI provides plenty of options, but graphically is rather odd in it’s conventions. Was not sure what one of the buttons even did. 3. There are some interesting settings available. The one I wanted most was to be able to fast seek in increments. The option seemed available, but I could not use back/forward on bluetooth headset to skip. if I enabled “Skip instead of fast seek” it would move between chapters. You could enable the volume button to act as fast seek and that worked. So I would like to see improvements in this area and the ability to create your own bookmark. Still its playback speed controls are better than all the other apps I tried.

After trying probably 10 other apps that claimed to do it, this is the only player I have found that goes over 2x playback speed without skipping. Fantastic, thanks!

The App is pretty close to what I was looking for for a long time! So far best what Ive found. What I value: 1. Function of increasing & decreasing playing speed. 2. Skipping back and forth (note I mentioned back at first) and the adjustment/customisation of skipping back function 3. Zoom loop to set the track to desired place and the display which shows the track seconds movement What I would love to see in further updates: 1. When a track is playing and I reopen the app (means app is running in background, track is playing) the app pauses the track. Thats what I most dislike. 2. In settings, title of functions are not very clear chosen, I dont get the feeling I know that to expect when I turn on/off a function. 3. In look screen, Im really missing the track time line (like it does when track is running through iPhone native music player); and a picture of the track (which as well appears in the middle of the screen on iPhone native music player). I hope that helps for further improvements. Software tester

This app is worthless. It doesnt split the book up into chapters like it claims too. Very frustrating. I want a refund.

I would give it 5 stars, but it only works for a couple days and then stops working (just goes to a black screen and eventually back to the home screen). I may be my old-ish hardware, but it is the only app I have that does this.

Doesnt support MP3. Doesnt show any of my audible books. Just seems to take 99c from my account and then runs away with it.

Update: Devs are responsive and looking into my issue. I continue to enjoy the app in its internal mode. -——------------- I listen to audiobooks daily and while AudioChef if my default favorite, I continue to use and evaluate most of them including AC, iAudiobooks, Bookmobile, etc. Each has different strengths … and usually do about 7 out of the 10 things I want. This app, while not the most elegant, has some nice features and is quite useful and quick to use. However, as in older version reviews, I could not make it keep track, consistently with my listening position in a book. This of course, would make the app useless. While trying to use it, I’ve found that one of the settings forces the app to use the Apple Player instead of its own internal player. Somehow, using the Apple Player really messes up the apps ability to keep each books listen position straight consistently. In the Internal mode, it seems to do quite well. The only reason I can see to use the Apple Player is that it can speed scrub backwards where the internal can only do the more traditional skip. No Biggie. So, don’t write this app off until you’ve at least tried it using its internal player only. Worth the 0.99 in that case. Note that the problems I’ve had in the Apple Player mode were for books consisting of 5 M4b files each consisting of a “chapter". The app in that mode seems to jump into the wrong chapter randomly. If you build your books as one very large .m4b file, I suspect it would work ok in either mode though I’ve not tried it yet. As I said, I’ve written the Devs and lets see what happens. Certainly, I want to encourage anyone willing to write audiobook players since I’m still on a quest for the perfect one!

Given the dirth of really good audiobook players that play your own content, this app is well worth a look. It has most of the features one would want. So, please look at it. On the other hand there are two persistent issues over the few versions I’ve looked at. There are workarounds but it can get frustrating if you don’t take the time to figure them out. 1. If you use the “Always use the iPhone Player” mode, the bookmarking for each book as you switch back and forth between books just doesn’t work well…. at least with the .m4b type files I tested. You randomly end up at the beginning of a random chapter. Since this app doesn’t keep multiple bookmarks for each book (Like Bookmobile or AudioChef) you then have nothing to go by and have to go searching for your last listening location. NOTE: IF YOU DON’T use the force iPhone mode then things work as expected. I don’t know if this is a coding problem in this app or an interface with the apple iPhone player that is the issue. 2. Even if you’re in the well behaved native player mode there is a GUI design choice that is problematic if you are not very careful with your fingers. An 1/8” misplacement of your finger results in a lost bookmark as well. Its not the code, but rather the GUI design. The “<“ button meant to take you back to the library listing is VERY close and above the “|<“ button meant to jump to the beginning of a chapter. If you accidentally touch the latter when trying for the former you lose your bookmark without noticing so that the next time you enter the book you are at the beginning of the chapter and your position is lost. CAREFUL use of your finger placement avoids this but since the app doesn’t retain older bookmarks, once it happens you’re toast and you have to go searching. If you’re aware of these, you can make fairly friendly use of this app. I like it better than most.