WiFi Streaming quality affecting mobile data ueage

[Anventia]

Plan

Premium

Country

Canada

Device

Pixel 7 Pro

Operating System

Android 16

My Question or Issue

Recently my Spotify streaming has been using 60-150+MB of data after streaming for around 30 minutes, I'm not sure why. 

My data saver in the app is set to Always On, streaming quality on data is set to Low, with auto-adjust Off, and downloads and video playback on data are also disabled. 

When I change my Wi-Fi streaming quality down, the data usage goes down, with the above usage happening with Lossless quality on WiFi. This makes no sense at all as the WiFi quality setting should not change how much *mobile data* it uses!

My mobile plan is 5G, if that matters. I only started noticing this problem around 2-3 months ago, and may have coincided with when I changed from 4G to 5G, but not sure. Maybe the app updated around the same time and this is a bug?

Any insight would be appreciated, and let me know if there's any more info I can provide!

[MihailY]

Hey @Anventia,

Thanks for reaching out.

Are you by any chance using Spotify in the car connected to Android Auto? We're currently investigating a similar issue here, so if that's the case, make sure to post your details in the thread and subscribe for updates.

If not, then it's a good idea to try some basic troubleshooting like clean reinstalling the app following these steps. Note that your settings will be reset after you're done so please adjust them again and let us know if the issue persists.

Keep us posted.

[Anventia]

I am not using Android Auto. 

I will try clean reinstalling and see if that works! I'll have to download every playlist again though, I wish there was a way to save which ones I had selected.

[Anventia]

Update: It did not solve my problem. 

Today on the way to campus it used 128MB of data, and on the way back, it only used 4MB. I think it may have something to do with the app using WiFi quality when on data, perhaps when I connect and disconnect to campus wifi as i'm getting closer.

[Vasil]

Hey @Anventia,

Thank you for the additional details 🙂 What you've suggested is a possibility.

To see if this is the case, would you mind toggling your Wi-Fi off and monitoring the data usage while on mobile data only? Alternatively, you could also lower the streaming quality when playing via Wi-Fi to see if anything changes. 

Keep us posted on how things go. We'll be on the lookout!

[Anventia]

I have done some more testing, here's what I've noticed:

Toggling Wi-Fi off and walking around campus, it doesn't use much. However, toggling Wi-Fi on, it sometimes uses a significant amount (likely when I lose connection and it falls back to data).

I then tested something: I was listening on WiFi, and it was Lossless. I then turned WiFi off, and it was still on Lossless. Normally I'd think that would be normal, as the song could just be cached, but the next few songs were also Lossless before it switched, using up 10+MB of data.

Lowering the Wi-Fi streaming quality to High did reduce it, but I'd rather not lower it any further and I hope this bug can be fixed.

[Vasil]

Hey again @Anventia,

Thanks for the prompt response! 
Have you noticed if the songs that continue playing in Lossless are the ones already queued up before the network switch takes place? Is the same behaviour observed when you manually select new tracks? 

In order to continue enjoying the Lossless quality without the fear of excess data loss, what I'd suggest for the time being is manually switching off your mobile data when you're going to be using Wi-Fi and restarting the Spotify app before switching back to mobile data 🙂 

Keep us posted on how things go. We'll be on the lookout.

[Anventia]

When I manually select new tracks, it is not on Lossless. When it does show Lossless and i'm on data, it does consume more data.

I will try to use your proposed solution for now, however it is not always ideal as there are many holes in the wifi coverage in my campus.

I also noticed today as I was listening on data, and I switched to WiFi, Spotify suddenly used 30+MB of data in a short time, which is really strange...

[Vasil]

Hey @Anventia,

Thank you for the feedback and for keeping us in the loop!

There is one more thing we can take a look into in the meantime - as Lossless tracks usually use much more data as what you seem to have experienced up to this point, I'm wondering if there might also be something else at play here. There is a recent issue where tracks are getting redownloaded upon relaunching the app, so I'd be on the lookout for this just in case you're affected by it as well.

Let us know if anything new comes up 🙂

[Anventia]

After I reinstalled the app, I have not downloaded any songs again so it's more consistent when testing, so this is likely not affecting me.