Google have done a fantastic job at hiding the option for us to submit new podcast feeds on Google Play. It’s easy to login and listen to music and podcasts, and seemingly impossible to login to the section in which to submit either.
I usually get there somehow by looking at my history, but I can imagine that’ll be lost at one point – so I did a bit of URL testing and tweaking and found out. Here’s how to find that mysteriously hidden URL.
First, head over play.google.com. At the top right you’ll have the opportunity to login if you aren’t already. Make sure it’s the correct account: some folks have a different account for submitting podcast feeds than for listening.
Notice the complete absence of a menu driven way to reach anything relating to podcasts, let alone the option to submit one. What we do get is a choice of categories on the left, one of which is Music. Select that.
Still nothing relating to podcasts is showing up. But let’s not give up! Choose My Music. This will load your “music library”.
To unearth the first sign of podcasts, over over that little “three-dots” icon underneath recent – it’s a fly-out menu of sorts that will – for the first time – show us what podcast feeds we’re currently subscribed to.
Now we’re cooking… or so it would appear. At the top of the screen we get two options, one showing us the Top Charts, and one showing us Your Podcasts. Those let us listen to what’s on the Google Play Podcast Directory – but not submit our own just yet. But we’re close!
This is where URL tweaking comes in. Right now, our URL in the browser bar reads something like this:
- https://play.google.com/music/listen#/podcasts
From this URL, let’s remove the listen# portion and add the word portal – like so:
This will give you a list of all podcasts this account has submitted to the Google Play directory, and a convenient button at the top right to submit other shows. Result!
And that’s it! I know, even though it works, it’s mega lame. Perhaps one day Google will have a dedicated URL for us to reach more conveniently. If they already do, or if there is an easier way, please let me know.