Apple Watch – Watch Play Source
The Pocket Casts Apple Watch app has two play sources, Phone and Watch 
. The Watch Play Source is a Pocket Casts Plus feature that gives you the ability to listen to episodes on your Apple Watch Series 3 or later, without needing to have your iPhone with you! All you need is a pair of Bluetooth headphones or a Bluetooth speaker (learn how to pair Bluetooth devices with your watch here).
In the Watch Play Source, episodes can be downloaded to your watch for offline listening, or if you have a watch with a cellular connection, you can stream episodes directly from your watch to the Bluetooth connected device of your choice.
How to download episodes to your watch:
Manual Downloads
To manually download an episode, tap it to open the Episode Details screen > tap Download.
Please note that to access the Episode Details of the Now Playing episode from the player, you will need to firmly press the Now Playing screen.
Auto Downloads
Auto Download is available for episodes in your Up Next queue; this can be switched on/off in the phone app only via Profile > settings > Apple Watch > Auto Download Up Next.
When this setting is first enabled, it may take a couple of hours for the first downloads to appear on your watch.
Improving Watch Downloads
Watch episode downloads can occur via:
- Wi-Fi directly to the watch
- Bluetooth from the phone
- Cellular (for cellular enabled watches)
Downloads generally occur fastest when using Wi-Fi. The following suggestions should force the watch to use Wi-Fi rather than Bluetooth:
- Put your iPhone in Airplane mode
- Put the watch on the charger
Please note: if the screen turns off during a download, the download will continue in the background. WatchOS handles scheduling of the background download and downloads may be throttled if conditions are poor (low battery, limited CPU resources). During background downloads the download progress may not be updated. Pocket Casts will be informed when the download completes or fails.
You can choose what to play on your watch, whether streamed or downloaded, from the main menu:
Now Playing
You can control the currently playing episode from the Now Playing screen which includes:
- Play / Pause button
- Skip Forward / Skip Back buttons
- These will match the Skip Forward / Skip Back settings you have set on your phone
- Playback Effects button
- Tap this icon to access Playback Speed
- Volume icon
- Use the watch’s crown to change the volume when this screen is active
- Up Next button
- This will display the number of episodes in your Up Next queue up to 9; it will display “9+” if there are more than 9 episodes
Firmly press the Now Playing screen for options to view Episode Details for the current episode, or for the episode to be Mark Played.If there are chapters, Previous Chapter and Next Chapter buttons will also be listed.
Up Next
This section will display the current episode in the player (Now Playing), and the episodes in your Up Next queue up to a maximum of 50 episodes. Tap on an episode to go to its Episode Details screen.
Firmly press the Up Next screen for options to go to Now Playing, the Main Menu, or to Remove All episodes from the Up Next queue.
Podcasts
This section will display the podcasts you have subscribed to on your phone. By default, podcasts are sorted by Podcast Name A-Z.
To change the Sort order, firmly press on this page > Sort Podcasts. Changing the Sort order on the watch, will not change the Podcasts Sort order on your phone, and vice versa.
Tap on a podcast to see the list of episodes in that podcast (up to a maximum of 50 episodes). Episodes on podcast’s page are sorted Newest to Oldest by default.
To change the Sort order, firmly press on a podcast’s page > Sort Episodes. Changing the episode’s sort order on the watch, won’t change the sort order on your phone, and vice versa.
A firm press on any page within the Podcasts section will also bring up options to go to Now Playing, and the Main Menu.