Chromecast Audio

[RevNZ]

All but one device in the house have lost casting connections to the chromecast audio device. I have completed the following.

Factory reset on Chromecast audio. Working fine in test mode and annnoucements

Same wifi network on all devices. Restarted router

Removed all devices from the network to troubleshoot with just the laptop (Mac Pro 2021) - Has been working for months. 

Cleared cache and history on the chrome browser

Here is the key highlight. Chrome browser on Youtube website can cast to the Chromecast audio device, as with several other music websites. Works well!!!

Spotify on browser and app can not. Chromecast audio device does not appear as an option!!!!

Spotify Premium account - New Zealand. Has been working until today for years. 

Help, very much appreciated after hours troubleshooting. 

[RevNZ]

Update.

All devices have now lost connection to Chromecast audio

All devices have had spotify uninstalled and re-addded, also removed and added chromecast audio again. 

Removed all devices from the network and tried one by one again. 

All devices can cast music apps, like Iheart Radio. 

Note. When casting Iheart radio it works, unless I also open (not cast) just open Spotify on any device, Iheart also can not find Chromecast audio. 

.....So it is all tied back to Spotify, how do I fix this please

[Alex]

Hey @RevNZ,

Thanks for reaching out about this in the Community. We'll do our best to help figure out why this might be happening.

Can you try connecting all devices to another network, like a mobile hotspot. This way you can check if the issue is network related at all.

Also, let us know if Spotify Connect works between devices like your phone and computer.

We'll be on the lookout for your reply.

[RevNZ]

The solution below, be warned as it is a long one. While it may take a few minutes to read, it took me weeks to solve it so I hope this helps. 

Firstly, before doing anything, make sure you have at the ready, all devices your profile is connected with and may or may not have casted in the past. Don't worry about devices you no longer own, however. Just those that are on your network and have had Spotify going. 

Remove all devices from your network, as in turn off wifi. Just one device, even in sleep mode may prevent this from working. This took me sometime to figure out. In one case, I had an old laptop that someone must have used a browser to listen to Spotify, this needs to be off the network. 

Chromecast. A real pain but I found out I also needed to factory reset this. Not because it was at fault, however, somehow Spotify was looking for the old device. Re-connect this to the network and test it. If this is all working with an app or browser that allows casting, you are good to go. 

Part of my solution was isolating and removing Chromecast as a problem. I found other apps worked fine, until I opened Spotify and then they would all stop. 

Let's get fixing!

One by one, open a device and open the Spotify app. Go to Settings>Device> three dots or click on the Chromecast devices if you see it. Click "forget this network". Check through the settings and delete anything you can find relating to the network. Sign out!

Delete all history of Spotify in the app settings of the device itself. Delete the cache of browsers, all browsers. 

Remove the device from the network again if you needed to connect it, before going to the next device. Painful but there are strings connecting these and these hold history. Check incognito windows, check anything you can find and delete Spotify. 

As above, this took me some time but was critical, as I missed one, started loading them all up again and one set it all back to zero again.  Painful!

Recycle your router. You may or may not need to do this. I did it countless times and so I have added it to the mix. If you are going this far, go all the way!

Start your first device, connect to your network and check again Chromecast with a browser or audio streaming app works. If so, you are good to go. 

Open Spotify, and try looking for a network to cast too. It may prompt you that it found a network, accept this! If not, go to the settings again, devices and add to the network manually. 

Repeat this on device two. 

Device three may require you to sign out of one of the first two devices first if your licence restricts the amount of devices using Spotify at once. 

As you work through these, be sure to go back and check the main devices still cast. If one doesn't, go back and repeat the process with that device. If all fail, you may have sadly met the same roadblock as I did and had to go back to the start. There will be one device that holds a lingering bit of Spotify history and due to the way the apps connects your profile across devices, it spreads. Sorry

A hint I wish I had considered, stop at the critical devices and don't try to connect the whole house/office again. This only makes the process longer if have to go back to the start. 

This should all work, if not, then Spotify have an escalation team that will provide you a temp login to run deeper diagnostics. Basic help steps and FAQ's didn't work for me, It may for others but this just wasted time knowing I had isolated the problem back to my profile and historical devices. This took me a long time, trial and error and thinking big picture. 

@Spotify, the UI is clever to recognise connected devices and create relationship history, however, there is a bug. I will leave it with you to find it 🙂 

[dave_jones1]

That's a lot of work. Well done on working it out. Has it remained successful or has any of the devices since dropped the Chromecast/s again?
I would not want to have to repeat it a week later.
My workaround is to open Spotify on Windows 10 desktop in the shed. If it can't see devices in shed (it generally cannot) I open spotify on the iPhone & see if I can see them there. If I can all good. Start music, then I can control it from the desktop. 

I run a group of Chromecasts in the shed - one audio & one pre-remote TV (round one).

If the iPhone app can't see them either I go in to Google Home on the phone. Use it to start media. Then I can control it from either phone or shed.

Spotify's desktop app is a great interface with a completely f#$ked casting interface. They really need to fix it. 

See pic "Spotify1". Started this morning with no devices. Opened app on iPhone & cast to shed group & it's there. The list should also show the Shed TV & Shed Speaker Chromecasts as individual devices (they are in the group) and clearly they're missing.