Spotify deletes my downloaded songs

[lucasknie]

I've had this problem since the start of my subscription, and it's making me reconsider if I should switch to a different service. It's happened multiple times - and I have hundreds of songs downloaded. Then suddenly one day, when turning my phone on and opening Spotify, I realize I'm logged out.

This in and of itself is a problem because I've been randomly logged out in situations when I didn't have access to internet, so I couldn't use the service I've been paying for for ages!

But once I get internet and manage to log in, the same thing always happens - all my downloaded songs are gone and when I check the settings, suddenly the default download location has been changed to internal storage (where I don't have any space for songs) without my intervention.

I'm a premium client, I've updated my app, I've used different SD cards, different networks (even used data) and I'm not downloading on any other devices.

This issue has been going on since I can remember signing up to Spotify premium and I would like a solution. It's a paid service!

[lucasknie]

I'm on a premium family plan I'm using a Huawei P10 Lite, Android v 8.0.0.

[Ivan]

Hey there @lucasknie, 

Thanks for reaching out - we’re here to help!
 

If the contents you downloaded for offline listening keep on disappearing from your mobile device you might need to get the latest version of the Spotify app. The best way to do this is by performing a clean (more thorough) reinstall of the app. This will let you start afresh with Spotify on any device.

Check out this help page in order to find the steps for clean reinstall on the affected device. Once you’ve performed the clean reinstall you'll need to re-download your offline music and podcasts. 

In case the clean reinstall doesn't do the trick for you, try disabling any power saving or data cleaning settings on your mobile device. Alternatively, you can try authorizing Spotify to run without restrictions despite the mentioned settings being enabled. Make sure you try this since such features can often prevent the app from operating at full capacity.

Keep us posted! We'll be here if you have any questions.  

[lucasknie]

Hi, I figured out what it is but it's still a problem.

Whenever my phone loses battery or I turn it off, when I eventually turn it back on Spotify starts before my phone can read my SD card, and therefore, not detecting the SD card (which is where I store my downloads as it's too much for the internal storage) all my downloads just disappear and Spotify changes the download location to internal instead of SD card. 

Is there any way to prevent Spotify from launching before my SD card is read, or from it launching at all when turning on my phone?

[lucasknie]

Might have found a fix!

But first I'd like to say how disappointing it is that this issue has been ongoing since 2013!!!!!! That is a huge failure on your part and it's ridiculous and unexcusable for a company with that many resources. A company that should be able to change the coding of the app to fix this issue that's been haunting users for ages, many switching over to other services, which I can't say I blame them for.

The advice that your support team has been giving on posts always tip toes around the problem. Someone needs to step up and fix the coding.

**bleep**, you just did that, claiming that I should "update my app" as if I and many other users didn't think of that. 

Let ME explain the issue to you, and keep in mind that I'm some random dude who apparently figured it out but whatever team is in charge of fixes seems to be oblivious, or incapable of providing a solution.

When a phone boots up, Spotify launches pretty quickly after the system starts. Now  why is that a problem? Because people who stored their downloaded songs in their SD Card will have their songs deleted because Spotify attempts to locate the songs before the SD Card is even identified by the device!

I managed to fix it by downloading some app that prevents startup apps, and adding Spotify to the list. 

It is simply infuriating that this is an issue that could be fixed easily through coding, what's the need for Spotify to launch so quickly?

I hope someone in your team reads this and does something about it, but for the people that got **bleep** over by this irresponsibility with their money like I did, I used the following app:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.advancedprocessmanager

Get yourself together Spotify!

[CAlbertSM]

Don't waste your time, this issue has been around since pretty much they started, there hundreds of threads about this and all they do is to link that automatic response, this issue is on them cause I experience this issue on iOS and Windows, even to the extreme I download my music, turn off Wifi, and 5 minutes later songs magically dissapear asking me to download them again.

[Elena]

Hey folks!

Thanks for writing in the Community about this!

There might be a few reasons why your downloaded songs might be disappearing. You can take a look at this page to see the most common ones.

We'll make sure to pass on your feedback to the right team here.

@CAlbertSM we'll be happy to provide you with some more troubleshooting steps if you give us a bit more info about your issue and what you've tried so far.

We'll need to know your operating system and Spotify versions as well as if this happens when you use a different network to download your songs.

We'll be keeping an eye out for your reply.

[CAlbertSM]

Android 8 Version 8.5.79.1061

Issue has been acknowledge since 2017 I have experienced across OS and devices to the point I even payed two other premium accounts to test if it was mine, no it's your service. I wish there's a way of posting screenshots.... oh wait there is but the mods keep deleting my replies with the screenshots it seems that reporting bugs and bad service with proof is against the guidelines.

[CAlbertSM]

See screenshots, at 9:52pm with WiFi, everything is downloaded, proceed to turn off WiFi and surprise 3 minutes later song is gone.

[Xenia]

Thanks for sending over these details @CAlbertSM!

We immensely appreciate the hard work and effort you've poured in to troubleshoot this on your end.

We are aware that some users do experience this issue and that there are quite a lot of reasons for why this can happen. However, after a thorough investigation based on the info we have gathered here in the Community as well as our other support channels, the relevant team was not able to confirm that this is an issue which is caused by Spotify, but rather based on how different devices manage their cached data files.

Still, we respect the fact that multiple users are affected by this issue, so we'd like to provide some steps which we hope might help:

• Check out the steps on our support page here

• Try disabling WiFi assist

• Check for any settings that could affect the Spotify background data

• Change the quality of the downloads in the Spotify app

In case you have your downloads stored on an SD-card, we’d also recommend you try the solution suggested in this thread.

Hope this info is useful. We'll be here if you have any other questions.

[CAlbertSM]

I'm a software developer myself, and I CAN ASSURE YOU NONE OF THOSE THINGS you mention is affecting my experience with Spotify.

- I don't have WiFi Assist enabled, Spotify is only blocked from using Data when in Data mode.
- Quality is not the issue since Windows quality is high, iOS and Android is normal, and the issue persists.
- Is not a faulty SD since my Android's SD is a Class 10 brand new SD, and iOS devices doesn't have SD, and the issue persisted.
- Spotify IS ALWAYS ON LATEST VERSION.
- I only have downloads on 3 devices: Windows Laptop, Android Phone, iPad.
- Content is not blocked or removed since is constantly being downloaded.

So maybe don't blame us for your lack of ability to try and fix this issue, because this issues has been around FOR THOUSANDS OF US SINCE MANY YEARS AGO.

Seriously are you trying to wash your hands and blame us for your issues? So you are telling me, Asus, LG and Apple are the ones to blame not you? Weird because I had 0 issues when I tried Apple Music, Amazon Music and YouTube Music. Maybe it's time to make the switch.

[jkd760]

I agree with all of this. Spotify has been doing this to me for years now. And I’ve tried all the things they suggest. The worst was when I went on a trip, I made sure I had everything I wanted downloaded ahead of time, only to find when I left (outside of service area), my songs ALL deleted. This is beyond annoying. Looking into other music services now...

[Xtian_69]

11/19/20 - Just experienced this AGAIN on android app after updating from google play store. What's scary is that it seems to be deleting RANDOM songs, no explanation for that. I noticed this when I try to redownload my library, some songs are instantly reloaded after going online mode, like it's only reconnecting/refreshing a link that's been broken (example: the message "downloading songs 1 out of 1200" instantly jumps to 20), but it actually stops and download song 21, then jump to another, stop and download another, on and on.

My solution is to copy the "Storage" folder from my PC to the Storage folder of my SD card and voila! It can work vice versa too when the Desktop app messed up. After copying, I just go online on the android app and this message: "downloading songs 1 out of 1200" instantly jumps from 1 to the very end.

Ugly but it's standard process: keep a back-up. You can keep the backup folder inside your phone, PC, etc.
Storage folder location on Mobile: Android\data\com.spotify.music\files\spotifycache\Storage
Default Storage folder location on PC: C:\Users\<your-user-name>\AppData\Local\Spotify\Storage

Hope it helps!

[Jeremy]

Hey @Xtian_69,

Thank you for your reply.

We understand that things can feel frustrating when it's not working as expected. Rest assure that we want to help you.

Can you confirm if you've followed the steps that @Xenia provided in the thread?

We'll keep an eye out for your reply.

Cheers!

[ThroughTheDawn]

I have exactly the same issue as identified by others. I use an iPod Touch 7th Generation that I use as my dedicated music device. I don't have an SD Card and I have very few other apps installed on the device (2-3) as I use it exclusively for music.

I downloaded a bunch of music when I first got the device in July and then kept downloading more as time went on. Then in October, so around 3 months after my first downloads, all of the first albums I had downloaded disappeared. The ones I had downloaded more recently stayed downloaded.

After that happened once, it has kept happening more frequently and I have the impression it is always the oldest downloaded albums getting removed first. I am now uninstalling and reinstalling the app completely but it makes no sense that I should have to do this.

I have gone through all of the troubleshooting points mentioned by the moderators, my app is always up to date, so is my OS version, no SD, I don't have more than 5 devices and I definitely log in at least once every 30 days.

I would provide more concrete info but it's very difficult to do as it's impossible to predict what is going to be deleted and when it is going to happen.

A permanent fix for this problem is seriously needed because a dedicated music device that randomly deletes music is just not workable. This is seriously making me consider switching to a different service.

[Jeremy]

Hey @ThroughTheDawn,

Thank you for your post and confirmation in this thread.

Can you let us know how many songs you approximately have downloaded?

Does this occur on one specific device or multiple devices?

It would also be great if you can let us know which version of the app you have.

We'll keep an eye out for your reply.

Cheers!

[gmh1]

Thanks man, this issue has made me seriously consider dropping Spotify a few times. Glad to see someone found a workaround that works.

Please Spotify, get your act together and add a 1 minute delay between your app startup and the SD card check.

OR, give people the functionality to remove their SD card for a second without making the data on it instantly unreadable.

Its pretty ridiculous that a company with $1 billion cash on hand hasn't yet found the $100-$200 labor cost required to add a startup delay to your app. This app is your single output. Downloadable music is arguably the most important feature, and the only way to keep downloaded music is for the customer to NEVER restart their phone or let it die. Such an embarassing flaw to have for so long.

[Trashify]

are you kiddin! almost everybody updates all

apps regularly and still spotofy keeps deleting my sonfs! your app is just trash and it’s annoying as **bleep**!!!! Donyou think i like to keep on re-downloading the same 1000+ tracks every once jn a while because your trash app doesn’t work right?

YOU fix your app or i‘m cancelling my membership.

[Dynamaso]

This has happened to me numerous time. I'm absolutely over it! I pay for a premium service and should NOT have to continually do this. It is frustrating, infuriating and getting to the point where I am seriously considering cancelling my subscription to Spotify. I NEED A PROPER SOLUTION TO THIS ISSUE not some pithy excuse. I don't have a huge amount of downloads on my phone (iPhone 12) but I expect the ones I do download be there when I want to listen to them. I use Spotify nearly every day. Please fix this once and for all!

[Peter]

Hey folks,

We just wanted to let you know that we're aware of an issue with users' downloads disappearing. This is now being investigated.

If you’re experiencing this issue, make sure to head over to this Ongoing Issue thread, click +VOTE and Subscribe to the thread to be notified of any developments.

Cheers!