Random songs/albums that aren't saved to library/playlist won't play

[sirarchimedes]

Plan

Premium

Country

 United States

Device

Windows PC

Operating System

Windows 10

My Question or Issue

 As a lot of other users have posted, my spotify will not play most songs that I don't have in a playlist already. It just shows the black disc icon for the album art and won't play. Additionally, a lot of playlists that I haven't downloaded, will show little to none of the songs actually in them. I have tried the host file fix that seems to help most people but it did nothing for me.

[sirarchimedes]

I have tried all sorts of fixes with the host file and none have made any difference unfortunately.

[sirarchimedes]

@jor3ka Thank you! This is the only thing that has seemed to actually fix it. Do I have to block spotify from auto updating or something?

[jor3ka]

To the spotify creators:

In your february+march update, you need to take into acount that premium acounts may have adblockers aswell - you can not suspend these accounts, neither can you block them from playing their music like you're doing in the february update. This should only apply for the free service accounts.

[jor3ka]

If you're a windows user, you can block spotify updating in the host file. Edit it with admin rights. I would only do this temporary until bugs are fixed in any later versions.

[FarboSicil]

Plan

Free

Country

Germany

Device

MacBook Pro Mid 2015

Operating System

MacOS Mojave 10.14.2

My Question or Issue

Within the last week this has happened to me almost daily:
I try to play a new song and it just won't play, there won't be any information about the duration of the song on the bottom and the cover will just not load, nor will spotify show the title of the song below the cover.

This seems to happen to random songs and I have tried a clean reinstallation of Spotify which I thought solved the problem but now I'm back with the problem...

[Loxer]

Hi there!

I know it sounds simple, but it's often overlooked. Could you try restarting your device? Sorry if this may sound a bit reptitive but if that doesn't help, try a quick clean reinstall of the app by following these steps.

Could you try it with another network connection? If possible try updating to macOS Mojave 10.14.3 to see if that helps 🙂

If you're still having trouble, could you let me know the exact version of Spotify and the exact version of the operating system you're running?

I'll see what I can suggest next!

[leffe69]

I have the same problem on my macbook air 2013. Runs macOS Mojave 10.14.3.

Tried all the steps that you are suggesting but nothing helps

[FarboSicil]

I tried the clean reinstall once more, which made it work for two days, now the problem is there again...

I'm on Mojave 10.14.3 now, my Spotify version is 1.0.99.250.g936eab8d

[Jeremy1Brusa]

I fixed it! Thank you so much!

[Daisy]

Hey there,

Thanks for reporting this to us! We have the right teams looking into this.

If you're experiencing this, please try the following first:

• Log out/in
• Reinstall
• Restart your device
• Clear cache
• Try a different internet connection

If that doesn't do the trick, please add your vote (+VOTE) here.

Thanks in advance! We will keep you all updated here 🙂

Have a great day.

[FarboSicil]

I also tried it when being on a different wifi network, still no change...

[user-removed]

Hi there,

Same for me. I tried a clean reinstall of the app but didn't change anything. It has done this for years, that's why I had stopped using the app. Sometimes it works, but most of the time it doesn't. Playlists on the left bar tend to work better but from any search I can't play songs.

Spotify version : 1.1.0.237.g378f6f25

Mac OS Mojave 10.14.3 (18D109)

[Guido]

Hey @FarboSicil, @user-removed and @leffe69

Thanks for gettingback to us.

Sounds like something might be up with your hosts file. Try following the next few steps:

1. Open Finder and, in Finder’s menu bar, select Go > Go to Folder. In the box, type the following location: /private/etc/hosts and press return.
2. A new Finder window will open and your Mac’s hosts file will be selected. Click and drag it out of the Finder window and drop it on your desktop.
3. To open it, simply double-click and it will display the file’s contents in TextEdit .
4. Check for any entries with Spotify in the address.
5. If you do find any lines with Spotify, please remove them
6. Save your changes and restart Spotify.

Hope that solves the issue! Let us know if you have further questions.

Have a nice day.

[AlyBaker]

I have the exact same problem with the spotify app on my desktop (mac) and even the online web player. With the desktop no songs will play. Once I search a song and click 'play' a blank disc will appear in the bottom left and the play button won't start the song. In addition all MY playlist and even the SPOTIFY currated playlist all appear 'empty'.  I have tried re-installing the app, I tried the above mentioned;  >hosts >deleting the address with spotify in it etc. Even if I try to use the web player the playlist load but none of the songs will play. It's been five days.

Software : Mojave 10.14.3

Acount type: Premium

Spotify version: 1.1.0.237.g378f6f25

Country: Canada

[leffe69]

Hello. This solution worked for me. Now i can play all songs on my spotify. Can also download to play offline. Thank you very much 🙂

[AlyBaker]

Okay I added the # infront of the line that included spotify under hosts. I realized before that I never re-dragged the hosts file from my desktop back into my finder window to authenticate it!!!!!! Thanks

[556br]

I tried all of these steps and now I cant play any songs and all the songs on my playlists got deleted.

[donpixe]

i have the same problem and nothing in this thread has helped. this has been going on for over a month now and i'm tired of it. i'm not gonna keep paying for an app i can't use.

[Peter]

Hey @donpixe and @556br,

Thanks for reaching out to us about this.

Could you let us know exactly which steps you tried, as well as providing the following info:

• exact Spotify version
• device + OS version
• a screenshot illustrating the issue?

Once we have that, we'll be able to look into this further.

Thanks! We'll be looking out for your replies.

[Guido]

Hello,

We're receiving reports from users that are experiencing one or more of the following:

• Unable to listen to tracks on the app or WebPlayer
• Playlists are appearing empty
• Unable to play songs/albums they haven't saved

We suspect that this has to do with an error in the host files which you can fix as follows:

Windows:

1. Open Notepad as an administrator (right-click - Open as Administrator)
2. go to File - Open and navigate to C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc
3. Choose "All Files" instead of "Text Documents" next to the File Name box. You'll see a handful of files. Pick hosts and click on Open
4. When the file is open, you will see a block of text with # in front of each line and might see entries like 0.0.0.0 website.com127.0.0.1 website2.com
5. Check for any entries with Spotify in the address. Examples may look like: 0.0.0.0 weblb-wg.gslb.spotify.com0.0.0.0
6. If you do find any lines with Spotify, please remove them.
7. Save your changes and restart Spotify.

MacOS:

1. Open Finder and, in Finder’s menu bar, select Go > Go to Folder. In the box, type the following location: /private/etc/hosts and press return.
2. A new Finder window will open and your Mac’s hosts file will be selected. Click and drag it out of the Finder window and drop it on your desktop. 
3. To open it, simply double-click and it will display the file’s contents in TextEdit .
4. Check for any entries with Spotify in the address.
5. If you do find any lines with Spotify, please remove them
6. Save your changes and restart Spotify.

If this doesn't help, please send us over the following:

• Device and OS version
• Spotify version
• A screenshot of what you are seeing in Spotify

Thanks and have a nice day!