Features
All of it. For everyone.
There is no Pro tier to compare this list against. Everything below is in the app on the day you install it, for nothing, forever. The only thing money changes in Vibral is that a show you like receives some.
Playback
One audio engine handles every source — streaming, resumed, downloaded — so the lock screen, the car and the widget always know what is playing.
Resume that is actually right
Vibral remembers where you stopped on every episode, not just the last one, and picks it up to the second on whichever device you open next.
Speed with Smart Speed
Set a pace from 0.5× to 3× and let silence trimming shorten the gaps without making anyone sound like a chipmunk. Stated as one value — "1.5× · Smart" — not three separate controls.
Per-show settings
One show needs 2×, another is music and needs 1×. Set a default and let individual shows differ, without repeating yourself for every episode.
Sleep timer that fades
Ends at a time, at the end of the episode, or at the end of the chapter — and fades out gently rather than cutting off mid-word.
It never ducks
Podcasts are speech. A lowered voice under a navigation prompt is a sentence you have to seek back for. Vibral pauses instead, and resumes when the interruption ends.
One engine, every source
Streaming, resumed and downloaded audio all run through the same playback layer, so the lock screen, the car and the widget are never left showing nothing.
Library, queue and downloads
Three filters, one queue, and a list that opens to something you can play rather than to a summary of itself.
Three filters, no menus
Unplayed, Downloads, Shows. That is the whole taxonomy, and it fits on the screen without truncating to "Unpl… Dow…".
One queue, called Up Next
A single place where what-plays-next lives, reorderable by dragging, with its count stated once instead of on three surfaces.
Downloads for real life
Automatic downloads for shows you choose, over Wi-Fi only or Wi-Fi and cellular, with an episode limit that cleans up behind itself and tells you what it removed.
Swipe to act
Swipe an episode right to play it next, left to mark it played or remove it. Detents you can feel, and nothing destructive without a confirmation.
Episode title first
Rows lead with the episode, because that is what you are choosing between. The show name and the duration go on the caption line where they belong.
Import from your old app
Bring an OPML file from wherever you are now and your whole subscription list arrives at once, feeds intact.
Chapters, transcripts and everything else your feeds carry
This is the part most apps skip. See the full map of what a feed can publish — every item below is a real capability, not a roadmap entry.
Chapters as a table of contents
Tappable list with a "Now" marker, a chapter row in the player, chapter titles on the lock screen — and on the car dashboard, which almost nobody offers.
Transcripts that follow along
Auto-scrolled to playback with the active line highlighted. Tap any line to jump there, or read the episode instead of listening to it.
Live shows, with real times
On air now, live in 12 minutes, live at 3:00 pm — plus a reminder. Not a vague "live soon" that means nothing.
Soundbites worth sharing
The clip the show itself chose, ready to play and share without you editing anything.
People and credits
Hosts, guests and producers named with their role, searchable, and — where a show has published a split — paid their share automatically.
Notes as published
Paragraphs, links and structure preserved exactly as the show wrote them, clamped to four lines with a real "Show more" rather than flattened into gray soup.
Discovery
Search runs on the open Podcast Index. Nothing on the screen was paid for.
Podcast Index search
An open, independent catalog of millions of feeds. No promoted results, no placement deals, no shows buried for publishing elsewhere.
Live first
The only time-sensitive thing on the screen goes at the top, and disappears entirely when nothing is on air.
Recommended by creators
Shows that other shows actually pointed at, taken from their published podroll — recommendations by humans rather than by an engagement model.
Search by person
Find a host or a guest and see everything they appear on, not just the show whose title you happened to remember.
Paste anything
A feed URL from a newsletter, a link someone sent you, an OPML export. If it is a podcast, Vibral will play it — directory listing or not.
On the lock screen, on the home screen
Everything outside the app reads from the same playback layer, so what you see on a lock screen is what is actually happening.
Widgets
One widget with one job: resume what you were in the middle of, in one tap, without opening the app. Small, medium, lock screen and StandBy families on iOS; a resizable Glance widget on Android.
Lock screen and Dynamic Island
Artwork, episode, show and — when the show publishes them — the current chapter title, updating as you cross each boundary.
iPad and Split View
Two panes when there is room, one column when there is not, keyed on the width Vibral actually has rather than on what device it thinks it is.
The browser
A full Vibral in a tab: library, Up Next, search, chapters, transcripts, support. Signed in it is your account; signed out you can still play any feed you paste.
CarPlay requires Apple's audio-app entitlement, which Vibral has requested and not yet been granted. Until it is, the feature stays switched off and we will not claim it here.
Android Auto is built and will arrive with the Android release. We will list it here once it is in your hands.
Privacy, accessibility and the quiet parts
The features nobody advertises, which are the ones you notice every day.
No account required
Everything core works without signing up. Without an account nothing leaves your device — and that is the default, not a setting you have to find.
No tracking, no ad tech
Vibral does not build a profile of your listening, does not sell anything about you, and carries no third-party analytics in the playback path.
Sync when you want it
Sign in with Apple, Google or email and your library, queue and position follow you between devices and the browser. Turn it off and it stops.
VoiceOver throughout
Every screen and section title is a real heading, every choose-one list announces its position, sheets trap focus properly, and state is spoken in words rather than implied by color.
Dynamic Type to the top
Text scales all the way up without clipping, overlapping or truncating to nothing — checked at the largest accessibility size on every screen.
Reduce Motion and Transparency
Honored properly: sheets cross-fade in place, decorative loops stop, and glass becomes a solid warm surface instead of a blur.
Nothing above costs anything.
No subscription, no unlock, no trial that expires. If Vibral is worth something to you later, there is a way to say so — and it is entirely up to you.