What is a podcast?

Podcasting lets you automatically receive the latest episode of your chosen programme as soon as it's available. With ourcurrent range of audio podcasts, you can take your favourite radio programmes with you on the move and listen wherever and whenever you like.

You can "subscribe" to receive a podcast, rather like you might subscribe to a magazine and get it delivered each week. All of the Classic fM's podcasts are free, and you can stop receiving the files at any time. If you'd rather not subscribe, you can download episodes of a podcast series individually.

In order to subscribe for a podcast, you need an internet connection and a piece of podcast software which is usually available free of charge. Once you have installed this software, it will check the Classic fM for new episodes of your chosenpodcast series and automatically download new podcast episodes for you.

You can then listen to these podcast episodes on your computer, or transfer them to a portable mp3 player.

How do I subscribe to a podcast?

You will need an internet connection; and a piece of podcast software or an RSS feed reader (see Related Links).

How you subscribe will vary depending on which software you have chosen. Three pieces of software popular with BBCusers are iTunes, Juice and Doppler.

You can also subscribe using a web-based "feed reader" such as My Yahoo or Google Reader. These work in a similar way to the podcast software but are online rather than application-based and you need to have an account - they're usually free and easy to set-up but you will need an email address.

To subscribe the first thing you need to do is add the "feed" of the podcast to your software (or online reader). The feed is where the software will go to each time it wants to check for a new episode.

One-click subscription

Alternatively, some software and readers provide one-click subscription. At the moment, the BBC provides quick links for iTunes, My Yahoo and Google Reader - just click the relevant one-click subscription button.

The software will do the rest.