topic Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing in iOS (iPhone, iPad)

Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

jeffintaipei — Sat, 01 Nov 2025 07:49:39 GMT

Plan

Premium

Device

Apple Watch Ultra 2 with cellular for streaming

Operating System

WatchOS 26.0.2

My Question or Issue

I turn on my Apple watch. I open Spotify. It first connects to my iPhone spotify. I change to the Apple Watch. I play music. Everything is fine.

HOWEVER

If I close spotify on the apple watch and then reopen it, it first connects to my iPhone spotify. I change to the Apple Watch. I play music, but the music stops after about 1 minute. The icon flicks back to iPhone. If i change back to Apple watch, the behavior persists. The same song or different songs, the music stops after about 1 minute.

AND

The same behavior occurs when not connected to the iPhone. On cellular, on a restarted apple watch, I can listen without problems. If i close the spotify app and reopen it, the music stops after about 1 minute.

IN OTHER WORDS, it is necessary for me to restart my watch every time I want to listen to spotify on my watch if i close the app.

I have restarted all devices.

I have logged out and logged in to all devices.

I have uninstalled and reinstalled on all devices.

Help.

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

Maria — Sat, 01 Nov 2025 14:58:21 GMT

Hey @jeffintaipei,

Thanks for reaching out on the Community! And kudos for the troubleshooting you've tried.

Just to check, are you connected to Bluetooth headphones when this happens? If so, could you check if the behavior persists with another pair?

It also worth having a look at the troubleshooting steps listed in this FAQ, to make sure we cover all bases.

Should the issue persist, it would be great if you could send us a few more details on what's happening from your end. Could you let us know:

Does this happen at any specific points, for example only when using Shuffle?
Does it occur in Offline Mode or with another connection?
Your current Spotify version.

Let us know how you get on!

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

jeffintaipei — Sat, 01 Nov 2025 22:17:11 GMT

Irrelevant empty placeholder answer. Your questions suggest that you didn't read my post. Are you a bot?

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

Luoric — Mon, 03 Nov 2025 14:47:32 GMT

Having the same issue with the apple watch Ultra 3, every song stops playing after 1 minute. Similarly happens both when i'm streaming on cellular and when i'm near my iphone.

Have you experienced this issue before?

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

Ezis — Mon, 03 Nov 2025 18:44:00 GMT

Having the same issues when running while Bluetooth is on with both cellular data and downloaded songs.

I've tried only once, but I think without any Bluetooth device connected (listening through the speakers of the watch) it's working fine. Yet, I don't want to run with my Apple Watch playing music!

Please fix this, it is so annoying and makes Spotify kind of useless to use for sports sessions.

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

Maria — Tue, 04 Nov 2025 10:56:21 GMT

Hey folks,

Thanks for posting in this thread!

As we're seeing a few new reports on this behavior, we'd like to investigate further. We just need more details on what you're experiencing from your end, as we haven't been able to replicate the issue. These details will help us narrow down the cause, and without context, it cannot be reported to the right folks.

So we can look into this issue, would you mind sharing the details requested in the previous reply? Any troubleshooting steps you've tried would be great to know as well, as it'll help us avoid repeating steps. For example, this includes a clean reinstall, re-pairing and restarting the devices, etc.

We'll keep an eye out for your replies!

@Ezis @Luoric

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

nwlodychak — Tue, 04 Nov 2025 20:56:40 GMT

Having same issue.

Basically leave phone, go on run with watch only. App stops playing a song, skipping song, song plays, stops midway through. Hitting play restarts the song from 0:00.

Honestly so annoying.

On cellular; there is for sure signal

On airpods; it is not them

Resetting the watch seems to work sometimes

Its happened to me three times already.

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

jeffintaipei — Tue, 04 Nov 2025 23:19:00 GMT

There are plenty of details from multiple users reporting the same thing, Maria. Maria, don't ask for more details. If you have nothing to offer except to ask for details, you are exacerbating the real problem: customer dissatisfaction with the product. It is counterproductive, Maria.

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

nwlodychak — Tue, 04 Nov 2025 23:28:34 GMT

fyi i’m on build id: 9.0.91.1231

apple watch ultra 3: 26.0.2

did not append in original message sorry.

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

RomainVa — Thu, 06 Nov 2025 09:43:41 GMT

I'm having the same kind of issue but little bit different on my side :

- when I use the Spotify app on my apple watch (with cellular), everything transitions smoothly, but the issue come randomly after. Sometimes I can go for 30-45minutes of music sometimes nearly 2-3 songs top.

Another behavior have changed also : when I'm listening it's almost every time when I'm jogging, and the alerts coming from the watch running app (like speed or time) stop the music before trying to start it again. Before the recent update of watch os, it was not stopping, it was fading but keep going and it was much more appreciable.

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

Maria — Thu, 06 Nov 2025 15:46:14 GMT

Hey everyone,

Thanks for your reports - we appreciate it!

Our tech teams are now aware and we have forwarded all relevant info that you have provided, to help them in the investigation. While we can't give you a specific timeframe for if or when this will be fixed, we recommend keeping the app, as well as the devices OS, up-to-date in the meantime.

@RomainVa - as your issue seems slightly different, it's possible that it's not related to what previously been reported in this thread. However, we can still recommend making sure you're running the latest versions, as well as re-pairing your watch to the phone.

Cheers!

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

Ezis — Sun, 09 Nov 2025 09:53:22 GMT

Hey there, here is my config :

- WatchOS 26.1

- iOS 26.0.1

- Spotify 9.0.94.275

- Airpods PRO 3.0

- Have tried with downloaded & non-downloaded song, with wifi or cellular data.

Issue : Whenever I play a song on Spotify Apple Watch, with the audio ouput on my watch directly and the Airpods connected to my watch, I can only listen to the first 2-3s and then the sound disappear, either pausing or just playing but without any sound. I don't have any issue when playing sound out of my watch directly, I did a complete 1hr run with this solution, but that can't be a long term solution please !

Can't reproduce on any other audio app such as Podcast.
Should I create another blog post ? Feel like it's related.

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

Ezis — Wed, 03 Dec 2025 10:39:15 GMT

Hey @Maria, any updates on this? It’s been a while, and like many threads on this blog, it’s still unresolved.

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

Vasil — Wed, 03 Dec 2025 10:59:56 GMT

Hey @Ezis,

Thanks for the follow-up question!
We don't have any new information to share at this point but we are aware of the issue. If anyone else is experiencing it, please share the details requested in @Maria's initial reply with us 🙂

Much appreciated.

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

needhelp111 — Wed, 03 Dec 2025 20:35:38 GMT

I am having the same issue.

Apple Watch SE with Cellular

Watch OS 26.1

Latest Spotify as of today

Airpod Pros 3

Spotify, watch and the airpods will act fine for one song and then Spotify buttons will grey out, song will no longer play and no other songs can be selected to play in Spotify. Sometimes the Spotify app can be closed and reopened and a new one time song can be played, but it then no longer plays additional songs after the first. Airpods are still connected and working as I still receive audio from the watch (this usually happens when I am running and at every mile the audio from my watch alerting me to completed mile still makes it to the airpods and I can hear the fitness app audio feedback).

What is the issue?

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

Yordan — Thu, 04 Dec 2025 08:50:31 GMT

Hey, @needhelp111,

Rest assured this remains on our radar and our tech folks are currently looking into it.

In the meantime, you did mention that you're running the latest version of Spotify on all devices, but could you confirm you've also tried the other steps from this article like resetting the watch's network settings or reinstalling the app from scratch to get rid of any potentially corrupted cache? If not, feel free to check it out and give the steps a go.

Cheers 🤘

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

Clivedold — Fri, 05 Dec 2025 02:42:03 GMT

This is an ongoing issue with years and at no stage has it even improved in the slightest. If your true to your word that the tech team are reviewing the issue then they must have went on annual leave without informing you a 2 years ago !!!!

Its not that hard, stop stringing people along and just tell us you’re not interested in fixing the problem.
Then we can all move along.

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

vmsferreira — Thu, 11 Dec 2025 05:46:38 GMT

I have the same issue, download the musics to the Ultra 3, but just play 2 to 3s and then stops. Maybe I should move away from spotify and start using apple music. Spotify you need to sort this out

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

Maria — Thu, 11 Dec 2025 15:16:45 GMT

Hey there folks,

Thanks for posting in this thread!

We've been seeing a few more comments here lately, and it's possible that the issue might be one that resurfaced just recently, as we had confirmation from the teams that this was fixed at one point. To investigate this further, we'll need some more details from you.

@Clivedold & @vmsferreira - Just to make sure we cover all bases, could you confirm if you've recently tried any troubleshooting steps? For example, re-pairing your watch or reinstalling the app.

If the issue persists, it would be great to know the exact make, model & OS version of your watch, along with the app version. These details will help with the investigation.

Cheers!

Re: Spotify on Apple Watch stops playing

d-d — Fri, 12 Dec 2025 15:22:43 GMT

Same issue here.

Apple watch ultra 3

OS: 26.1 (23S37)

AirPods Pro 2

Cellular Plan on the watch

Spotify app at its latest update

When choosing to listen via the watch no matter the phone device is in range or not after 2-3 seconds the audio stops while the songs continue to play on the watch app. Every time I disconnect and connect again the AirPods the same thing happens. 2-3 seconds and then the songs continue playing without sharing any audio via the AirPods.

I have tried to reinstall the app to the watch and also reboot the watch. Additionally I tried to start streaming via the mobile app and then transfer it to the watch but once again after a couple of seconds the audio stops.