Enjoy podcasts in half the time

I’m a podcast junkie. I subscribe to far more podcasts than I’m ever going to get the time to listen to or watch.

Here’s an interesting fact about downloaded podcasts, either audio or video, that rely mainly on the spoken word – you can play them back at twice the speed and still understand what’s being said. I indulge in podcasts this way, theoretically going through twice as many as I would otherwise.

Speeding up podcast playback on your computer

Here’s how to play back a podcast at double speed from your iTunes library using Apple’s QuickTime software.

1. In iTunes, right-click the podcast episode you want to play and choose Show in Finder (Mac) or Show in Windows Explorer (Windows). A Finder or Explorer window appears.
2. Right-click the episode and choose Open With… QuickTime Player 7.
   If QuickTime Player 7 isn’t in the list, choose Open With… Other, find QuickTime Player 7, and choose it from your Applications folder (Mac) or Program Files folder (Windows).
   Your podcast appears ready to play in QuickTime.
3. In QuickTime, go to the Window menu and choose Show A/V Controls. The A/V Controls dialog appears.
4. In the bottom right corner of the A/V Controls dialog, set the Playback Speed to 2x.
5. Play the podcast.

Speeding up podcast playback on an iPhone or iPod Touch

You can speed up the playback of audio podcasts on an iPhone or iPod Touch using the speed adjustment icon while playing the podcast.

In the following image, the 2x icon at the top right changes to 1/2x or 1x as well, giving each podcast three possible playback speeds.

Podcast playback at twice the speed