PodScope support

Need help with PodScope? Email us at support@magicboxsoft.com and we’ll get back to you.

PodScope is a macOS app that transcribes and searches public podcast feeds, entirely on your Mac. It runs on macOS 26 (Tahoe) or later.

Common questions

How do I add a podcast?

Paste the public RSS feed URL into PodScope’s New Project sheet and choose Add. The app downloads the feed, lists every episode, and lets you transcribe any of them.

If you don’t know the RSS URL, look on the show’s website — most podcasts publish one. Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Pocket Casts, and similar apps can also export the RSS URL for any show in their library.

How is the Free version limited?

The Free version is a working evaluation of PodScope — enough to take a podcast through a complete analysis end-to-end — with two usage limits:

• 5 transcripts per project, lifetime. You can listen, search, label speakers, and export indefinitely after that — Free just stops creating new transcripts in that project. The count is cumulative: deleting a transcript does not free up a slot for a new one. (This keeps the offer honest — Free is an evaluation of the workflow, not an unlimited rolling allowance.)
• 1 project at a time. Delete the existing project to start a new one. (Existing transcripts and exports are not deleted from your Mac; PodScope only forgets the project.)

Free transcription uses Apple’s built-in on-device speech recognition. Premium unlocks a higher-accuracy on-device model along with the additional capabilities listed below.

What does Premium add?

Premium is a one-time purchase (no subscription) that unlocks:

• Unlimited transcription across unlimited projects
• Higher-accuracy on-device transcription
• AI recaps of each episode, generated locally
• Voice prints — name a speaker once, recognize them automatically across all your projects
• Reprocess earlier Free transcripts at premium quality without losing your speaker labels
• Publish a no-track static website from any analyzed feed

Premium restores on every Mac signed in to the same Apple ID, and is shareable through Family Sharing.

Why does the Transcribe button say “Upgrade to Premium” or “Restore Premium”?

That project has reached its 5-transcript Free limit (or already had more than 5 transcripts from a previous Premium session). You can still listen to, search, label, and export every existing transcript — Free just stops creating new ones.

The exact button text depends on your purchase history:

• “Upgrade to Premium” — you’ve never bought Premium on this Apple ID. Tapping it opens the in-app purchase sheet.
• “Restore Premium” — you previously had Premium (refund, Family Sharing turn-off, or a new Mac sign-in). Tapping it restores your prior purchase at no charge.

I lost access to Premium. What happened to my data?

Premium is a one-time non-consumable purchase, so it does not expire. The two situations that can revoke access on a given Mac are an Apple-issued refund and Family Sharing being turned off by the purchaser.

Either way, nothing is deleted. All your projects, transcripts, recaps, voice prints, speaker labels, phrase lists, and exported files stay on your Mac. PodScope just disables Premium-only actions until you restore.

If you had multiple projects on Premium, PodScope asks you to pick one as your active Free project the first time you launch without Premium. The others stay readable, searchable, and exportable — they just can’t accept new transcription or generate recaps until you switch to them (Free still allows one active project at a time) or restore Premium.

The premium speech-recognition and recap models on disk (about 4 GB total) are kept for 30 days in case you restore Premium quickly. After 30 days they’re removed; restoring Premium later re-downloads them.

You can also delete them manually at any time from Settings → Models if you need the disk space sooner. (If your active transcription driver still requires the model, switch to Apple’s built-in speech recognition first on the Subscription tab — the Delete button unlocks once nothing in the app needs the model.)

Where is my data stored?

Everything — your projects, audio files, transcripts, recaps, voice prints, speaker labels, exports — stays on your Mac in standard application data and the folders you choose. PodScope does not upload your data to Magic Box servers. The only outbound network traffic is to the RSS feeds and audio hosts you tell the app to load.

Can I export transcripts and metadata?

Yes, on both Free and Premium:

• Transcripts — plain text, Markdown, or JSON (per-episode, with timestamps and speaker labels)
• Metadata — JSON or CSV (episode lists, dates, durations, transcription status)
• Combined Markdown — every transcript in a project, joined into a single Markdown document

The exports always include every transcript present in the project, including any you created while on Premium and kept after a downgrade.

Can I publish a website from a feed?

Yes, on Premium. The static-site generator outputs a self-contained folder with per-episode pages, transcripts, recaps, search, and styling — no JavaScript trackers, no analytics calls, no external dependencies. You can open the folder in a browser, drop it on a USB stick, host it on GitHub Pages, or upload it to any web host.

Generated sites stay on your filesystem after a Premium downgrade — you can still view, reveal in Finder, and open them in a browser. You’ll just need Premium to regenerate them.

Why won’t a feed parse?

Some feeds are temporarily unavailable, malformed, blocked by the host, or missing required RSS fields. Try opening the feed URL in a browser; if it doesn’t return readable RSS/XML, the feed itself is the problem. If the URL looks fine but PodScope refuses it, email us with the URL and we’ll take a look.

How do I report a bug?

Open Help → Report a Problem… from the menu bar and fill out the in-app form. It pre-fills your macOS and PodScope versions, lets you describe what you were doing and paste any error message you saw, and (optionally) attaches a redacted diagnostics bundle so we don’t have to ask follow-up questions. You stay in control of what gets sent — nothing leaves your Mac until you tap Send.

If you’ve enabled crash reporting in System Settings → Privacy & Security → Analytics & Improvements, Apple has already shared an anonymized crash report with us. Mentioning the approximate time it happened in the form helps us find it.

Have more questions?

Email support@magicboxsoft.com.