Queue ignores playlist and repeats 4-5 tracks

[gran_cabrón]

Plan

Premium

Country

US

Device

Moto X4

Operating System

Android 9

My Question or Issue

I have a playlist with a series of albums that play through in-order because there's a story. There are roughly 100 songs in the playlist, and I do have the playlist downloaded to save on mobile data. If I start playing the playlist and look at the queue, it shows the normal 80 songs you would expect.

However, spotify can seldom play all the way through the playlist because it will randomly cut off the queue to only 4 or 5 songs. This tiny segment of the playlist will play and then the music will stop (or switch to [artist] radio). There is no indication that this is happening until the music stops.

I figured out what was happening when I turned on repeat. Once the queue gets cut off, spotify will repeat those 4-5 songs only. If I skip to the previous song, it will skip "backwards" to the last song on the queue, as if I had built a tiny playlist.

It tends to happen most often when I am connected to my car or my JBL Flip 5 via bluetooth. I can sometimes induce this error by skipping a song with the forward button, or restarting a song with the back button.

I've tried uninstalling/reinstalling a clean app according to the instructions I've seen linked on so many other questions, but the problem still occurs. Given the absolute clownshoes design of spotify's queue in general, is this somehow just the intended behavior of spotify's queue, or some feature that I'm just using wrong?

[gran_cabrón]

Hey folks!

Sorry to see this is still ongoing.
We are going to try to prioritize this investigation in the hopes that we can finally get to the root cause and fix the issue.

If you haven't already, please let us know the following details:

• Your device + OS (+additional device (speaker, etc.) in case the issue manifests itself there)
• By rough estimations - the exact time the issue started to appear
• The last time it happened
• The number of songs that get repeated and the number of songs in the playlist overall
• The troubleshooting that has been done so far
• Any additional details/screenshots that come to mind which you believe might help us resolve the issue quicker
   

Many thanks in advance. We'll do our best to get to the bottom of this asap.

[Edwin71]

@Vasil, I think the dev team should work the other way around too: instead of waiting for input from users (by the way, there is plenty already) dive into the codebase and find the place(s) where it decides to cut the playlist short to only 5 songs. There must be a reason or a trigger for that - in the code.

[Yeetuss]

I’ve had this same issue. I have a playlist that is 3 hours long and I have songs I’ve never heard since they were added. When I put it on shuffle it plays the same 10-20 songs over and over. I kid you not I had to skip the same song 3 times within a 15 minute period of listening. I would think the algorithm would get you don’t want to listen to the song when you repetitively skip it, but I guess not. 

IOS 16.2 

Has happened since special shuffle was added

Happens every day regardless of playlist

Approximately 40-50 songs on playlist 

10-20 play on repeat 

Troubleshooting has been deleting and redownloading, re-logging, turning shuffle off and on, resetting network connection, making shorter playlists, and restarting phone. (Nothing worked btw)

[graphoniac]

It's 2023 and I'm still having this exact same issue, have tried ALL the troubleshooting the others in the list have, and it still does it. The pattern I've personally found is that it seems to loop after I've switched audio devices. This is common with me, as I have a bluetooth bose speaker on my desk that I listen to at home, but then I have to go get the kids from school so I switch to my car and when I switch back again to my desk I realize quickly that it's become the 5 song loop wherever in the playlist I was when I left. Doesn't matter how long the list is. And I never use Shuffle so that's not it either.

The only "fix" I've found is just opening the playlist and choosing any other song in the list manually. That seems to reset it until I change audio devices again.

[123321332]

Same problem...

Plan

Premium

Country

US

Device

Pixel 6

Operating System

Android 13
Been happening for a year?
Last time it happened...TODAY
Played and repeated 5 songs

[ChrisWho]

And it continues. 

Plan:  Premium

Country:  Australia

Device:  Samsung S21 Ultra

Software:  Android 13

Last happened:  This morning at approx 8:40am

Playlist:  Release Radar

When I got out of my car yesterday, I was about 75% through the playlist.  When I got in the car this morning, it started playing the first track from the playlist, not from the start but about 30 seconds in.  This was NOT the track playing when I got out of the car yesterday.  It then played the next two tracks and stopped. When I hit play again it played the same three tracks and stopped.  Three freakin tracks FOR A FREAKIN HOUR because I was on the highway trying to get to the airport.  Why are you continuing to require all this information when the issue is quite obviously NOT device, plan,country or playlist specific?  It is in your code. FIX IT.

[moskrin]

Now in three days they're shutting off the old desktop version I've been using that doesn't experience this problem, so I guess either I have to only listen from my phone with its old version that I refuse to update or I need to find a new music solution.

[TSF007]

Fart

[moskrin]

What makes you think I'm from Australia? I'm in America. I imagine with
as many users as they have, they can't be wading through every email, but a
bit of engineer engagement here would be nice. I keep hoping the problem
will strike one of their developers and that'll lead them to finding the
bug.

[Eeeers]

• Mac 12.0.1 iMac desktop 
• 4:10pm today (for the upteenth time, generally speaking). I have a tiny playlist that I'm trying to use the "Enhanced" feature to help discover more songs like it. Though I've done this before, this is admittedly a 4-song playlist. however, with "Enhanced" enabled, there are about 25+ songs showing in the playlist (which is expected/appreciated). However, only about 5 songs in, it's already repeating one of the songs on the playlist. I swear Spotify used to have a "Do not repeat songs" option that I can no longer find.
• I think this might be happening more when I use the "Enhance" feature to discover new songs. Most of my playlists have dozens/50+ songs on them. 
• I typically just comb through my settings to try to make "repeat" stop after I hear another repeat.
• Again, I feel like there used to be a "do not repeat" option in my Playlist and/or general settings that I could toggle on/off. If there are variables that tend to counteract each other, maybe consider creating an option that allows a user to explicitly select songs they want repeated, assuming that most people don't want it.

[Tessifus]

Ugh, I googled this error hoping to find a solution but see it's been going on for at least a year for many people. It's so annoying. It plays a few songs normally and then I get stuck in a loop. I'm either driving and have to change to radio, or in the bath and have to get out of the bath to manually go past the loop. It's completely random when it happens and what playlist it happens. But it keeps happening.

[Coffeeman27]

It is still happening.  It is fine one day, then some other day it is a small loop of 4 or 5 songs.  Its maddening because its always in the car - never in the house - and you dont know until it does the loop, so you are already driving.

It should not matter what OS, etc... the app should never play a short loop.  It should just play the whole playlist.

[joshp75]

Plan

Premium

Country

Australia

Device

Pixel 7

Operating System

Android 13

I have been having the exact same problem. Listening to a playlist in the car, connected to the car stereo over bluetooth. Occasionally Spotify will cut the queue down to about four or five songs from the current playlist. The only way to get it to play anything else is to physically go and select the playlist again and start playing. Obviously I can't do this while I'm driving so I'm stuck with the same few songs on repeat over and over.

Interestingly this only ever happens while listening on my car stereo (connected through bluetooth).

[joshp75]

This just happened to me again. 

Here is a screenshot of the cut-off queue:

and here is a screenshot showing the actual playlist that I was playing. Note how it clearly has a lot more than five songs.

 

[SteveFS]

This used to happen in my 2016 CX5 over Bluetooth. Upgraded to a 2021 Hyundai Palisade (growing family) and it hasn't happened since.

Galaxy S10+

[SteveFS]

Spoke too soon. Still happens over Bluetooth. Only 5 songs.

[moskrin]

Spotify shut down support for the old desktop version I was using, so I've
switched to listening to Prime Music on my computer and I still have
Spotify v7.9 on my pixel which doesn't have this problem. The "home"
screen doesn't load at all, but the music searching and playing parts are
fine. I just can't have multiple clients on multiple devices or have
modern clients or the queue handling goes right to **bleep**.

That this is my "solution" to this problem is extremely sad. That there is
not a single feature they've added since v7.9 that I consider necessary is
also pretty sad. They should just revert the whole codebase back to that
point and try again.

I did recently try to upgrade to the latest android client and within a day
the problem surfaced so I went back to good old 7.9

[kilpatricko]

this is happening to me today. Samsung galaxy S20, spotify version 8.8.38.144. playlist has 100+ songs, i only hear 5 on repeat. shuffle on or off, change sort order  makes no difference. app has been clean installed too.

another device samsung s20 sptify v8.8.36.522 does not have this issue

[Coffeeman27]

It's so weird that it does this! A playlist is just a list. Spotify,
please fix it !!!

[rhapsodelia]

When I play Spotify on my Bluetooth speaker (JBL Flip 4), it now only plays 4 songs then pauses. If I hit play, it restarts 4 songs ago (first in the playlist or middle of the playlist, depending on when I connected to my speaker). This occurs whether I use Wi-Fi or mobile data. It doesn't occur with a downloaded playlist.

I am using the Spotify app (version 8.8.36.522)

On a Pixel 6 (Android 13)

Connected to a JBL Flip 4 

This started happening daily a few weeks ago; it happened tonight.

4 songs always get repeated regardless of playlist length.

I have reset my speaker to factory default and restarted my phone multiple times.

[branedamig2]

This is happening to me as well. 
1. iOS 16.5 when playing through Spotify Connect, AirPlay, or Bluetooth earbuds. 
2. I’ve seen this as long as I’ve used Spotify but more within the couple weeks - really noticed it badly last Friday, June 9 and it has worsened since. 
3. Happened as recently as today, June 13, 2023. 
4. Every 5-10 songs that play a song plays that previously played. 
5. I have cleared cache, restarted, logged out/in, rebooted, and it always starts happening again to some degree… gets worse the more music I play. 
6. This is very frustrating and makes even casual listening annoying to the point other services have to be used.