Podcasts are important to Apple, building one of the largest and best platforms for podcast creators to launch their shows. However, the experience on the web was about as barebones as it could be. That finally changed this week.

As first noted on Wednesday by 9to5Mac, Apple overhauled its Podcasts on the web interface, bringing it up to date and adding oft-requested features. Up to this point, the web interface for the platform only offered a way to see individual episodes in a show, as well as keep tabs on shows in general. There wasn’t any way to actually play that content on the web, though.

Today, Apple Podcasts on the web now officially supports playback so you won’t get kicked out to iTunes to listen to the content. Episode titles are now bold, and you can click on them to dive right in. In addition to that, the Podcasts for web interface now shows full episode descriptions as well.

What’s more, the overhaul added dedicated pages for each individual episode in a show. With these pages, podcast listeners can quickly see an episode’s description, as well as included show notes.

It’s worth noting that there aren’t any playback controls. So you can basically start and stop an episode, but that’s about it.

All of this comes hot on the heels of a separate report that indicates Apple is gearing up to launch a new. dedicated Podcasts app for macOS 10.15, which will launch later this year.

Our Take

It is admittedly a little crazy that it took this long for web playback to launch, and the fact there aren’t any playback controls seems a bit half-baked. But better late than never, right?

[via 9to5Mac]