Adding a star to an episode will prevent it from being automatically deleted according to your Auto Archiving settings.
You can find this action in the player toolbar options which can be customized to include the four most used actions in the toolbar and the rest are only a tap away.
- Tap the mini player
- In the full player screen tap the star icon ☆ from the toolbar (which can be customized)

- Tap the episode row
- Tap the star icon ☆ in the top right
- Group Episodes within a podcast
On a podcast’s page tap the three dot menu > Group Episodes > select Starred. - Create a Smart Playlist
Tap the Playlists tab and follow the steps to create and configure a new Smart Playlist. You can configure a rule for the Smart Playlist to only show starred episodes.