Terms of service
Last updated 9 October 2026
These terms are the agreement between you and Podmaniac for the use of the podcast hosting service at podmaniac.com and host.podmaniac.com. By creating an account you accept them. They are written to be read, so please do.
1. Who we are
Podmaniac is operated by Terence Rhoda, a sole trader based in New Zealand, trading as TRK Digital ("Podmaniac", "we", "us"). You can reach us at hello@podmaniac.com.
2. The service
Podmaniac hosts your podcast: it stores your episodes, publishes your RSS feed, delivers your audio to listeners and podcast apps, gives you a website and an embeddable player for your show, counts your downloads, and, depending on your plan, lets you place your own sponsor messages in your episodes, AI transcripts and show notes, video episodes, automatic YouTube videos, subscriber only episodes, team access, a custom domain and the tools to move an existing podcast in. Each plan's features and allowances are listed on our pricing page, which forms part of these terms.
Podmaniac is a hosting tool, not an advertising business: we do not sell advertising, we do not operate an advertising marketplace or network, and we take no share of any sponsorship income you earn. The sponsor message feature only inserts audio you supply, for sponsors you have found yourself, into your own episodes.
3. Your account
- You must be at least 18 years old and give accurate details, including your name and a working email address.
- You are responsible for keeping your password safe and for everything done under your account. Tell us at once if you believe someone else has access.
- One person owns an account. Team members you invite act under your plan and your responsibility.
4. Plans, prices and payment
- Plans are billed monthly or yearly, in advance, and renew automatically until cancelled.
- Prices are shown in US dollars before tax. GST, VAT or sales tax is added at checkout where your country charges it, and the checkout shows the total before you pay. Your bank or card converts the amount to your currency at its own rate.
- Our order process is conducted by our online reseller Polar (Polar Software Inc., polar.sh). Polar is the merchant of record for all our orders: it sells you the subscription, charges your card, calculates and remits the tax your country requires, and issues the invoice. Polar's terms for buyers apply to your purchase alongside these terms. Invoices are issued by Polar and name the seller as "Podmaniac via Polar Software, Inc."; on your card statement the charge appears as POLAR*podmaniac.
- If a payment fails, Polar retries it. If it keeps failing, your subscription ends and the rules in section 7 apply.
- We may change prices. An existing subscription keeps its price until we give you at least 30 days notice by email, and you can cancel before the new price applies.
5. Free trial
- The Basic and Smart plans come with a 14 day free trial for new accounts. A payment method is taken at the start; nothing is charged until the trial ends, and you can cancel before then at no cost.
- Each account gets one free trial, on whichever of the two plans it starts with. Switching plans during the trial ends the trial, and the first payment for the new plan is taken at once.
- A trial may not be used to publish and remove podcasts repeatedly, or taken more than once by the same person under different accounts.
6. Changing or cancelling your plan
- Moving up to a bigger plan, or changing from monthly to yearly billing, takes effect at once. The difference for the time left in your current period is charged to your payment method.
- Moving down to a smaller plan takes effect at the end of the period you have paid for. Nothing is charged or credited. A move down is only possible once your account fits the smaller plan (for example, the number of podcasts and people it allows).
- You can cancel at any time from the Billing screen. Your podcast keeps serving until the end of the period you have paid for, and you are not charged again.
7. When a subscription ends
When your subscription ends, whether you cancelled or a payment failed, the following happens unless you choose a plan again:
- Days 0 to 30: your feed, episodes and website keep serving. You cannot create or upload anything new. We send reminders.
- Day 30: your feed, episodes and website go offline.
- Day 90: your episode files (audio, video, transcripts and chapter files) are deleted. Your account, show details and episode texts remain, so you can come back and upload again.
If you are moving to another host, set the feed redirect in Show settings before your subscription ends. The redirect keeps working after the subscription ends, so your subscribers follow you.
8. Refunds and cancellation policy
- First payment: if Podmaniac is not right for you, ask within 14 days of your first payment for a subscription and we refund it in full. This applies to the first payment only, not to a plan started after a free trial you already used, nor to a second subscription.
- Renewals: renewal charges are not refunded, because you can cancel at any time before the renewal date and keep the service to the end of the paid period. If a yearly renewal is charged and you ask within 14 days, and you have not published a new episode since the renewal, we refund it.
- Changes between plans: prorated charges for moving up are not refunded.
- How to ask: email hello@podmaniac.com from the address on your account, or use the link on your Polar receipt. Refunds are processed by Polar to the original payment method, normally within 5 to 10 working days.
- Nothing here limits the rights you have under the law of the country you live in, including the right to cancel within 14 days where that right applies to you.
9. Allowances and fair use
- Each plan includes a number of podcasts, a monthly upload allowance, a number of people per show and the features listed on the pricing page. Allowances reset on the first of each calendar month.
- Episode files may be up to 5 GB each. Audio episodes are MP3, M4A or AAC; video episodes (Pro and Studio) are MP4, M4V or MOV.
- Downloads are unmetered on every plan. This is for normal podcast listening. If an account's traffic is far above what its plan is designed for over two months in a row, we may ask you to move to a bigger plan or to a different arrangement; we will talk to you first and nothing is switched off without notice.
- Storage is unlimited for episodes that are part of your podcast. The service may not be used as general file storage or to distribute files that are not your podcast.
10. Your content
- You own your podcast. You keep every right in your audio, video, artwork, text and feed. You can export your feed and leave at any time, and we will redirect your feed to your new host if you ask.
- You give us the permission we need to do the job: to store your content, deliver it to listeners and podcast apps, render it into videos and transcripts where you ask for that, show it on your website and player, and send it to services you connect, such as YouTube.
- You are responsible for your content. You must hold the rights to everything you publish, including music, clips and artwork, and any licences your content needs, such as music licences for DJ mixes. You are responsible for what your sponsor messages say and for complying with the rules that apply to sponsored content where you publish.
- If we receive a valid notice that your content infringes someone's rights, we may take the content offline and will tell you.
11. Acceptable use
You may not use Podmaniac to publish content that is illegal, that infringes rights, that is malicious or deceptive, or that is intended to manipulate download statistics or podcast charts. You may not attempt to interfere with the service, probe its security, or resell it without our agreement. We may remove content or suspend an account that breaks these rules, and we will tell you why.
12. AI features
- AI transcripts and AI show notes are made by automated systems and may contain mistakes. You review them before they are published; nothing is applied to your podcast until you choose to apply it.
- Smart, Pro and Studio include free AI hours each month (2, 4 and 8 respectively). Beyond them, AI time costs $1 per hour of audio, billed by the minute, and nothing when unused.
- Your transcripts may be sent to our AI provider to write show notes. They are not used to train AI models.
13. YouTube and other connected services
- When you connect a YouTube channel, you are also agreeing to the YouTube Terms of Service, and Google's Privacy Policy applies to the data Google holds. You can remove the connection at any time in Show settings or at myaccount.google.com/permissions.
- Podcast directories (Apple Podcasts and others) apply their own rules to listings. We help you submit; acceptance is theirs.
14. Removing a podcast or an account
- Removing a podcast is immediate and final. Its feed, website, episodes, stats, sponsor messages and subscriber feed stop at once and cannot be restored. The feed address stays reserved so nobody else can take it, and a feed redirect you set beforehand keeps working.
- To close your account, remove your podcasts and email us. Copies of removed content are erased from our systems within 7 days, as described in our privacy policy.
15. Statistics
Downloads are counted on our servers following the IAB Podcast Measurement Technical Guidelines v2.3 (unique listeners, a minimum of one megabyte, known bots and crawlers removed). Our counting follows those guidelines; it is not certified by the IAB. History imported from a previous host is shown as a total and labelled as imported.
16. Availability and changes
- We aim to keep the service available at all times, but we do not guarantee uninterrupted service. Planned maintenance is announced where possible.
- We improve the service continuously and may change or retire features. If a change materially reduces what your plan includes, we give you notice and you may cancel for a refund of the unused part of your paid period.
17. Our responsibility
- We provide the service with reasonable care and skill. We are not liable for loss caused by things outside our control, by your content, or by services you connect.
- To the extent the law allows, our total liability to you for any claim is limited to the amount you paid us in the 12 months before the claim.
- If you use Podmaniac for business purposes, the New Zealand Consumer Guarantees Act 1993 does not apply, as the law allows. Nothing in these terms limits rights that cannot be limited by law.
18. Ending the agreement
You can end it at any time by cancelling (section 6). We can end it, with notice, if you break these terms or if we stop providing the service; in the second case we give at least 60 days notice and refund the unused part of your paid period.
19. Privacy
How we handle your data and your listeners' data is in our privacy policy, which forms part of these terms.
20. Law and disputes
These terms are governed by the law of New Zealand, and New Zealand courts have jurisdiction, without taking away protections you have as a consumer in the country where you live. If something goes wrong, email us first; most things are sorted out in a conversation.
21. Changes to these terms
If we change these terms in a way that matters, we email account holders at least 14 days before the change applies and note the date at the top of this page.