Some of the most popular entertainment apps out there have sections devoted to curating the best podcasts for their users. Spotify, Apple Music, and Google are no strangers to the importance of podcasts. In fact, Google spun off long-form audio content into a dedicated Google Podcasts app pre-installed on Pixel phones. The service was also tightly integrated into Google Search, but it has recently disappeared without any explanation.

If you searched for a popular podcast on Google Search, you used to see a dedicated interface listing recent episodes with a play button next to them. Hitting that button opened the Google Podcasts player and allowed you to start the chosen episode. However, a report from Podnews (via 9to5Google) reveals Google has stopped showing the play button and any link to Google Podcasts in Search. Instead, results now only contain links to reviews, other podcasting platforms, and websites managed by individual podcast hosts.

When contacted, a Google representative told Podnews the move was very much intentional, and just another step to improve the user experience. Interestingly, the company hasn’t added new features to the aforementioned Podcasts app on Android for the last one and a half years, after a flurry of refinements in the past. The associated Creator Program also shut down in January 2023, fueling speculation that Google may pull the plug on Podcasts for good.

The Podcasts app has been around since 2018, existing alongside YouTube and YouTube Music. When pressed, Google insists the former serves its own niche and that nothing will change for now. We remain suspicious because the company has a penchant of sorts for discontinuing interesting and seemingly successful endeavors like Loon, Stadia, Google+, and Hangouts.

The removal from Search could be a sign of changing times for Google’s approach to podcasting, or even a sign of its eventual demise. However, without a clear official explanation from Google, a lot is open to interpretation.