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As a fan of podcasts, audiobooks, and listening to longform journalism, my audio options have recently, and shockingly, narrowed.
My favourite audio app, Audm, which created a curated collection of stories from the likes of the New Yorker, the Atlantic, and Vanity Fair, read by real professional narrators, has just shut down.
The app’s owner, the New York Times, killed Audm, which it purchased in 2016, in favour of bundling audio versions of its journalism into the recently launched subscription-based New York Times app. That’s a big loss, as Audm offered sensational value at $110 a year, delivering hundreds of narrated articles from some of the best publications in the world. Audm’s $27.50 refund on my subscription gave me little solace – that was an indispensable app.
Stitched up
Then came another blow with news that Stitcher, one of the world’s most well-established podcast apps, is shutting down on August 29. Its owner, satellite radio operator Sirius XM, is instead going to incorporate podcasts into its subscription business. There are many podcast apps, but Stitcher had been around for 15 years, and was one of the best ones.
You can see where this is going. Standalone audio apps that previously offered free, ad-supported, and premium audio services are being co-opted by their owners to drive subscription revenue for their other products.
It’s a sign of the tumultuous times in audio, which has boomed as a content category in recent years, particularly through the pandemic when we were all desperate for something to distract us from the monotony of lockdowns and endless working from home.
Spotify’s podcast blues
That growth was clearly unsustainable. In June, music-streaming giant Spotify axed around 200 jobs from its podcasting division after previously cancelling numerous high-profile podcasts and shutting down its in-house podcasting studio.
Still, ratings data suggests podcasts still attract 90 million listeners a week in the key US market, so although the business model underpinning podcasting is being shaken up, there’s still an audience hungry for audio.
After all, it’s the most convenient way to consume content, where you can sneak in a few minutes’ listening to an article here and there, and speed up the audio playback to get through a podcast or audiobook more quickly. That’s why I’ve gone all in on audio.
With the demise of Audm and Stitcher, I’ve been rebuilding my audio app collection. Here are the five killer audio apps I’ve settled on.
Audible
I’ve been a subscriber to Amazon’s audiobook service for years ($24 a month) and considered cancelling several times. It is on the pricey side, given you are issued just one credit to buy an audio book each month as part of your subscription. But Audible has the best audiobook collection available and the heft of the Amazon e-commerce operation behind it.
Just as I was considering pulling the plug on Audible, Amazon sweetened the deal by adding a much bigger collection of audiobooks, Audible exclusives, and podcasts as part of my subscription (Audible Premium Plus). I can typically now find 2-3 books a month worth listening to for the monthly fee. The app itself isn’t my favourite to use, but I love the seamless integration with Alexa smart speakers, so I can stream an audiobook or podcast in any room, and pick up later on my phone exactly where I left off.
If the price of an Audible subscription is a bit rich, check out the audiobook options from your local library. Libby/OverDrive and BorrowBox are widely available across our libraries, and although the selection is limited, you can reserve a spot to access new releases and best-sellers.
NOA
The closest thing to my beloved Audm is Curio, a similar service that features narrated articles from more than 30 publications. But at US$16.66 a month for a subscription on an annual plan, I just can’t stomach the high price – nearly double what I paid for Audm. So, I’ve instead migrated to NOA (News Over Audio).
It has a narrower range of publications, including Bloomberg, Fast Company, the Telegraph and the New York Times. But the articles are typically short form, 10-30 minutes rather than the hour-long pieces I enjoyed listening to on Audm. There’s a decent amount of content on the free plan, but a US$110 annual subscription unlocks the full collection. A user-friendly app for busy news junkies.
A cheap alternative if you want to have news read to you is to use a podcasting app such as Pocket, which converts text to audio. You simply share the link to an article you haven’t time to read and Pocket will convert it into an audio narration. The downside is that you don’t get a professional narrator voicing the piece. Pocket, like Peech and other text-to-audio apps, uses an automated language system, which is okay, but a bit stilted at times.
However, Pocket is great if you have a lot of big documents you need to get through. If the file is hosted online, you can send the link to Pocket and have the text converted to audio. If it’s a news-aggregation app you want, there are probably better apps out there, but I like the text-to-audio conversion here, and it’s a pretty app interface. The premium, ad-free version costs US$65 a year.
Spotify
The combo of music and podcasts is a powerful one, which Swedish streaming giant Spotify understood when it added podcasts to its app and recruited Joe Rogan, the world’s most listened to podcaster, to launch its podcast platform.
Spotify still has the best music-streaming app interface, curated lists, and overall listening experience. Spotify’s move into providing audiobooks has been less than impressive, with expensive titles and a limited selection. It is no Audible killer. But podcasters have flocked to the platform – you can even find my own podcast, The Business of Tech, from BusinessDesk there. An individual Spotify plan costs $16.99 a month, but you can use the app to listen to the podcasts for free. Video podcasts are also supported – a nice alternative to YouTube.
Pocket Casts
While Spotify has become my default replacement for Stitcher, I’m also very impressed with Pocket Casts, an open source podcasting app for Android and iOS devices that has pretty much everything you need. There’s good search functionality to find the podcasts you want, a decent interface and the ability to speed up the audio and skip past the introduction. It’s also free, and because it’s based on open source software (it’s owned by the maker of the WordPress blogging platform), its community of listeners can work on bug fixes and new features.
