Chapters: Apple Update

Claire Waite Brown: 00:00:00

Welcome back to Podcasting 2.0 in Practice.

In November: 2025

If you're not sure what chapters are or why they are good, head Back to episodes 8 and 9 of this podcast where Daniel J. Lewis is my expert guest and I give instructions for how to locate chapters on relevant listening apps. Naturally, for this show called Podcasting 2.0

in Practice, the clue's in the name, and in fact for all podcasts I produce, I make my own 2.0 chapters and I'll talk more about the benefits of making your own over allowing Apple to auto generate them later.

In this episode I add images and links which are of great use for this show since I can attach step by step pics to the relevant chapters so the instructions I give can be followed along visually as well as audibly.

In the aforementioned episode nine, I list which 2.0 podcast apps support chapters and at the time of release those were the only places you could go to see a podcast's chapters.

Now those chapters and their images, but not the links can be seen by anyone listening to this show in Apple Podcasts, which I think is great news for listener experience, but also because when Apple does stuff that makes that stuff mainstream, not on the fringes, who knows, perhaps Apple will start supporting some of my other favourite Podcasting 2.0 features. Pod roll, anyone?

For more context regarding Apple and the Podcasting 2.0 ecosystem, check out episode 16 of this show where James Cridland chats with me about Apple supporting transcripts, both ones they make themselves and ones podcasters supply using the 2.0 standard.

Back to Chapters how this will work for podcasters is if you supply your own chapters through your hosting provider, Apple will populate your episode with those chapters. If you do not supply your own chapters, Apple will auto generate chapters for your episode.

So you can do absolutely nothing because if you don't supply your own chapters, Apple will automatically make them for you.

But if you want to make your own chapters and attach images, you simply need to follow my instructions in episode 15 of this podcast where I tell you and show you of course how to input 2.0 chapters with a number of hosting companies that support them. Let's look at the pros and cons of letting Apple make your chapters as opposed to creating your own.

The first and possibly only pro is is that you don't have to do the work.

But bear in mind that when Apple make chapters for you, they will only show In Apple Podcasts 2.0 standard chapters will appear in Apple, but also in Pocket Casts, TrueFans, Fountain, and Podcast Guru and possibly others too. Plus, with Apple leading the way on this, other apps that don't currently support chapters might soon follow suit.

So make your own chapters with your hosting company and they are automatically populated in all supporting podcast apps.

A con for Apple and Pro for making your own is control, both at the point of creating the chapters and in the future when you might want to change them.

If you don't like what Apple makes, you can edit their chapters by downloading the auto generated list from Apple Podcast Connect, editing the timestamps and titles, then add them to your episode description with your host or back in Apple Podcast Connect, which could be a good option if you host your podcast with a company that doesn't support 2.0 chapters.

However, if your host does support 2.0 chapters, surely it would make the most sense to create them there and easily update them whenever you want or need to. And finally, images.

Apple auto generated chapters do not include images and you can't add them yourself either since what is generated is purely text based. But your audience can see chapter art in Apple Podcasts.

If you have made your own chapters with pics attached and again you can change these at any time with your hosting company, you may think that you don't need images with your chapters, which is absolutely fine, but let me give you an example example of how I use them in my podcasts, even those that aren't giving step by step instructions. Creativity Found is a guest based show, personal life stories told through the lens of adults finding their creativity.

So why would I use chapters with images for that? To show a piece of art or a knitted creation or a source of inspiration that changed the guest's perspective.

These are just a few examples for Creators from TrueFans, a show I make with Sam Sethi that showcases independent podcasters.

I use my guests podcast show art in the chapters to give a visual reminder to listeners that will stick with them when they go looking for that show to listen to for themselves. Although they don't need to search if they're listening in a 2.0 app since each chapter includes a link too. But you get the idea.

And so to the homework for this episode.

As a listener who wants to see the chapters in Apple and their picks if relevant, much like the instructions for other apps in episode nine, start by locating the play screen as you listen to an episode, click on the icon at bottom right that looks like three lines of bulleted text on the next screen, you may need to click a down arrow to show the list of chapters. Click on the chapter you want to play and hey presto, it will play on this screen.

You will see the pic associated with that chapter at the top of the screen. Click on the bullets icon again to go back to the play screen where you will see the image at a much better size.

Also, when your phone goes into Rest mode, when you pick it back up, the chapter art will be on your phone's home screen.

Back in the Apple app FYI while we're here, click on the icon of the speech bubble with quotation marks inside to show the transcript at the point you are listening. I've already explained how to add chapters as a podcaster. Basically, revisit episode 15 of this show or be lazy and let Apple do it.

If, however, you absolutely do not want chapters on your episodes, your own or auto generated, there is a box you need to uncheck in Apple Podcasts Connect. So log into Apple Podcasts Connect and click on your show on the left of the screen. Click on Availability, then simply uncheck the chapters box.

Thanks so much for listening. Visit creativityfound.co.uk/podcasting to access lots of useful podcast resources and find out more about my guests.

Click on the funding icon on any 2.0 app to make a donation to this show, or visit buymeacoffee.com/creativityfound. If you'd like to get in touch, you can send a comment, boost or super comment using any of the modern podcast apps we talk about in this podcast series. Or feel free to reach out to me on my Instagram account @Podcasting2.0inPractice.