Privacy
Pode is a local-first app. It runs on your Mac, stores everything on your Mac, and does not talk to a Pode server — because there is no Pode server.
What Pode collects
Nothing. Pode does not include analytics, crash reporting, or any other form of telemetry. It does not phone home on launch, on crash, or on any other event. There is no account to sign up for and no identifier tied to you.
What Pode stores on your Mac
- Subscriptions, episodes, and playback state — written to a local SwiftData database in your app sandbox.
- Transcripts, AI summaries, takeaways, and concept definitions — stored in the same local database. They never leave your Mac unless you copy them out.
- Downloaded audio — saved to your app's caches directory so offline playback works.
- API keys for AI providers — stored in your macOS Keychain. They are read by Pode only when you trigger an AI action.
What Pode talks to over the network
Pode makes network requests only to services you've directly asked it to use:
- iTunes Search API — public podcast directory, used when you search for shows or browse charts. No identifying information is sent.
- Podcast RSS feeds + audio files — fetched directly from whatever host the podcast publisher uses, the same way every podcast app does.
- Your chosen AI provider (Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, or a custom OpenAI-compatible endpoint) — only when you ask Pode to summarize, ask a question, or generate a concept definition. Calls go from your Mac directly to the provider using your key. The provider's own privacy policy applies to those requests.
- Hugging Face — only the first time you download a local Whisper model. After that, transcription runs entirely offline on Apple Silicon.
What Pode shares
Nothing, with anyone. There is no "share" button that uploads your library, no leaderboards, no community feed. Your listening is yours.
Children
Pode is a general-purpose podcast app with no targeted advertising and no data collection. It is not directed at children under 13 and contains no mechanism that would collect data from them.
Your rights
Because Pode doesn't have your data, there is nothing to request, export, or delete on a server. To erase everything, drag the app to the trash — macOS will remove the app sandbox along with it.
Changes
If this policy changes in a way that affects users, the updated version will be posted here with a new "Last updated" date.
Contact
Questions about privacy: hi@podecast.cc.