Not enough hours in the day? Try listening at double speed

We’re all trying to be more ‘mindful’ and ‘find space’ in our day, but what if there was a simple hack to cram a little bit more in every day?

If you love podcasts, there’s a new trend you need try – listening to your favourite shows at up to 5x the speed.

Known as ‘speed-listening’, hundreds of thousands of people are crunching through audiobooks and podcasts at breakneck speed, according to a report in The Times.

Blitz through your favourite audiobooks and podcasts

So, what’s the appeal? Fans of the technique say they not only save time, but listening at high speed also helps them to focus and improves concentration as the pauses and long silences are cut out.

And if you’ve always wanted to listen to epics like Lord of the Rings or Game of Thrones, which can take up to 33 hours per book, once mastered, this technique could get you through them in half the time.

Speed-listening takes a bit of getting used to. Most popular podcasting apps including Apple Podcasts, Pocket Casts have a built in feature where you can increase the playback speed by 1.2x, 1.5x and even up to 5x regular speed.

Or if you’re feeling hardcore, there’s an app called Rightspeed that can take you up to 10x.

If you’re ready to give it a try, we recommend starting with 1.2x speed. We found it became natural and voices did not sound high-pitched or distorted after just a few minutes.

The downsides

Listening to anything with music in it will sound awful. And some podcast producers regard the technique as sacrilege – ‘spoiling’ the art of pauses, intentionally there to help you reflect on what’s being shared.

Speed-listening is also the subject of heated debate on Reddit discussion boards, particularly with smart students who use the technique to cram as many recorded lectures as possible in record time.

But watch out for the biggest side-effect – how quickly ‘high speed’ can become normal. Many have reported after speed-listening for a long time, real-life conversations start to sound uncomfortably slow.