Desktop app (Windows) not working, multiple issues

[modernalt]

Plan

Premium

Country

USA

Device

PC

Operating System

Windows 10

My Question or Issue

Spotify desktop application has been having multiple issues, I have already followed the Help article for a clean reinstall and made sure there were no files/folders on my drive before reinstalling. My PC does not have any issues running any other application, I use it for video editing/gaming and it is more than powerful enough. Note - my Spotify account is having no issues when using on my other devices ( iPhone 13 IOS17, iPad Pro 11th gen IOS17).

I will try to list the issues here and cover all details: 

Playlists are currently taking 30 - 60 seconds to load and 9/10 just saying "Couldn't find that playlist" [see screenshot attached]

App is freezing after booting and menus become unresponsive immediately

Songs are playing at max volume when I am able to press play and only playing once then the app freezes 

If I am able to get a song to start playing, the app interface freezes and even after closing the music continues to play max volume. I even go into task manager and close all Spotify processes there and the audio keeps playing which is extremely frustrating. 

Not finding any help online so turning to community forums. Happy to provide any other information as needed, thank you

[shredder002]

Plan

Premium

Country

U.S.A.

Device

(Acer Aspire)

Operating System

(Windows 10)

My Question or Issue

My desktop app has, for about a week now, been completely broken. When I open the app I am met with a gray screen with nothing on it. If I close the app and try to open it again, I am met with an error message; "Spotify is not responding right now". This pops up over and over again until I open task manager and kill the app, finally allowing me to reopen the app, only to be met with the same gray loading screen again.

If I leave the app open in the background for a several minutes, it finally loads the content. However, this is not the end of the problems. Once the app is showing content, I go to start playing a song or playlist. Clicking on the play button for a song or playlist does not immediately start the song, but instead takes 10-15 seconds before it starts playing. Pausing a song once it has started is similarly slow, as is changing the volume.

Even if you can get the song you want playing, when it ends the whole app pauses for nearly a minute before playing the next song. Finally, once I give up on the whole thing and close the app, it continues to play music until I end Spotify from the task manager.

I have restarted my computer and done many clean reinstalls to no avail. After a fresh install, the app loads perfectly when prompting me to sign in, only slowing again once I have logged in.

[Elena]

Hey there @modernalt,

Thanks for reaching out on the Community. Great job on providing all the details for us! 

To start, could you check for updates for your device's operating system? You can also try a restart of the computer if there's no updates available.

Also, do you notice any difference if you're connected to another network? For example, if you're using your home WiFi, you can try creating a hotspot on your phone to which you then can connect your computer.

Keep us posted on how it goes!

[modernalt]

Hello Elena,

Thank you for the quick reply - I did try those two solutions and no luck. I am still getting the same results when using a different network. Happy to provide additional info as needed to try and resolve, I am left with only being able to use the Web player via Chrome to listen on my desktop. 

Thanks,

Cannon

[Lyubka]

Hey @modernalt,

Thanks for getting back to us. @shredder002, thank you for reaching out as well -  we've merged your post here as your issue seems similar, we hope you don't mind. 

Folks, first off, open the Desktop App's Settings and turn off "Enable hardware acceleration". This setting is located under Compatibility then restart Spotify. After you toggle it off, the setting should look like this.

As a second step, we'd suggest that you disable any antivirus or ad-blocking software that might interfere with the app's performance on your PC. 

Lastly, it's worth checking your hosts files - steps for this can be found here.

In case the issue persists, we'd like you to try to reproduce this with a different account. If a family member has a Spotify account, could you ask them to log in on your device to see if the app behaves the same way?
 

Hope something here helps. Don't hesitate to reach out if you have further questions 🙂 

[modernalt]

Hello @Lyubka, 

I appreciate you merging our two posts here as they are similar. I also appreciate @shredder002 listing their issue as that is an exact description of all that my app is doing as well. I am having the exact same problems listed, my Spotify is reacting in the same way when trying to play music of any kind. 

I checked my host files and there were no host addresses listed in the file when I ran as Admin. I have disabled Hardware Acceleration and are still seeing the list of issues persist post restart. 

Thanks for your help trying to get this resolved! Any further help will be appreciated. 

[MihailY]

Hey @modernalt,

Thanks for your reply.

As a next step, can you please try the following:

1. Open the app's settings.
2. Enable Local files under Your Library.
3. Disable any sources that you see under Show songs from.
4. Disable Local files again.

Let us know if that helps.

[modernalt]

Good morning @MihailY,

I just attempted your possible solution, verified there were no Local Files sources listed, and restarted my application as well as my computer. Started working fine and then within 20 seconds of playing a song the entire application became unresponsive. I even closed the app and it continued playing audio forcing me to go to my Task Manager and stop the application. 

[MihailY]

Hey @modernalt,

Can you please also try uninstalling the app and installing it again from a different source? If you're using the Microsoft Store version, try the one from our website and vice versa.

Once you install it, go through the previous steps again and make sure that the local files sources are disabled before disabling local files altogether.

Keep us posted.

[modernalt]

Good evening MihailY,

I have completed your requested steps and am still having issues with the app. I have uninstalled and reinstalled from the Store version to the Desktop version and removed the local file sources, still no luck. 

Can you please review my Account and determine if there would be anything we are missing that could be causing these issues? Getting desperate here, thank you for any help.

Thanks,

Cannon Ruth 

[modernalt]

I would like to add at this point also - I am available to share via a troubleshooting session over Zoom or otherwise for any help to get this resolved. I also tried using the Web player today to listen and my Library just shows as unavailable now. Almost like there is some major issue causing problems here whether related to my device or account. Getting very difficult to continue using the application now. 

Thanks,
Cannon Ruth

[Lyubka]

Hey @modernalt,

Thanks for keeping in touch and for the troubleshooting you've tried so far!

We'd recommend restarting your PC in Safe Mode with Networking to see if the issue would persist there. Safe mode basically allows only the core Windows programs to run, which would help us narrow down the probable cause for this, as it's possible that another program is interfering with Spotify. Head here to see how to do that.

 Let us know how things work out, we'll be keeping an eye out for your reply 🙂 

[Flaoua]

I have a premium Spotify account and this morning when I opened the Spotify Windows Desktop app (I'm on Windows 10) it just stopped working.
At first it was "only" the announcements that weren't loading and when trying to launch a song, nothing would happen.
I tried rebooting the app, logging out/in, then rebooting the PC itself. No change.
I then uninstalled and reinstalled the app and now it's not even showing me my library or my profile picture anymore, and I still can't play any song. When I click on play, nothing happens.
The only thing it seems to be fetching correctly is my play history..

Note that if I go on the web version, everything works fine.

Any help welcome! 🙂

[shredder002]

Hey, sorry for lack of response. I've tried every suggestion I was able to and saw no improvement. I have been able to use the web player and the mobile app with no problem, it's just the desktop app that is having these issues.

However, I did try using spotify in safe mode and it seemed to work a lot better. It still took a minute to load but that's probably more to do with the computer still starting up at the time. The audio drivers were disabled so I couldn't verify that I could hear anything, but clicking play on a song responded immediately. It seems that safe mode made it run much better.

[AlejaR · Accepted solution]

Hey folks,

Thanks for your replies here and for the info shared. 

@Flaoua, at the moment, it's possible to download the app from both the Microsoft Store and our web page here. So, in this case, if you installed the desktop app from the web page, try to uninstall that version and try installing the one from the Microsoft one or vice versa.

If the above doesn't do the trick, would you mind running the app in Safe Mode or Safe Mode with Networking to rule out any issues with your default Windows settings and basic device drivers? Give it a try and let us know how it goes.
 

@shredder002, thanks for keeping us in the loop. As mentioned before, Safe mode allows you to run only the core Windows programs, so most likely, another program is interfering with Spotify. If you haven't yet, you might need to check for any local settings on your device that could be blocking the app. In case there's any antivirus software or such that could be restricting access to the app, try whitelisting Spotify.  

Just to confirm, do you use a VPN? If yes, try switching it off. Keep in mind Spotify doesn't officially support VPN. This means that issues with the app while using VPN are expected behavior.

Keep us in the loop!

[Flaoua]

Thanks a lot for the reply.

It seems that uninstalling the version I had downloaded from the Spotify web page and replacing it with the version from the Microsoft store did the trick 🙂 

[modernalt]

Hi AlejaR,

Thank you for continuing the thread and helping those affected by this weird bug. I can confirm after doing the same, uninstalling and reinstalling through the Microsoft store, the app appears to be working now. Whether that was an issue that got fixed via an update to the Spotify core or otherwise, I am able to use the Store version of the app without issue. Thank you for your help and you are free to close this as resolved now. 

[tominator2804]

As soon as I try to play any song on the Spotify Desktop App I get the error message. The songs do work if I use the Web Version though. I already tried cleaning out my host files, loging in and out, reinstalling the app and updating my drivers - nothing works 😕

[Appliest]

But Why? Which Error Occur?
Visit this: https://community.spotify.com/t5/Your-Library/Watch-and-Listen-Introducing-music-videos-on-Spotify/t...

[tominator2804]

As written in the title: The error is "Spotify can't play this song right now"