Unable to play most music on desktop.

[MStanbrook]

Plan

Premium

Country

UK

Device

Desktop

Operating System

Windows 10.

My Question or Issue

As of today I am unable to play a wide selection of music on my desktop. However the symptoms are really odd.

- I can play all my podcasts.

- Certain music plays from the Home page but not much.

- None of my playlists will play.
- For songs that won't play the details pane on the right appears to be trying to load and failing - it goes blank.

- I can see my other local devices on my network in the app.

- I can direct music that will not play on the desktop to play on my phone, my home cinema, etc and it works fine.

- If I use my phone or the desktop app to direct a currently playing song go the desktop device it tries to do so but nothing plays. As above with a podcast the function works fine.

- I can create and edit playlists but nothing changes.

- I can download playlists and albums but nothing changes.

- Local files play fine.

- Altering download/stream quality has no effect.
- Clearing cache and downloads has no effect.

- Reinstalling has no effect.

My best guess is it's either a DRM authentication problem or a codec one. If only the application generated logs like... every other application.

[hubertboggins1231]

Plan

Premium

Country

UK

Device

Laptop

Operating System

Windows 11

My Question or Issue

Whenever I try and play a song on Spotify desktop, it doesn't play a song. Originally, it was able to play two albums in my library, but after reinstalling Spotify it can no longer play anything. What's strange is that offline mode is able to play my downloaded songs, even if they don't work online. Spotify web is also able to play any songs, and if I use it to stream songs to my desktop app, I can control the queue and the song it is playing (works as normal), but the second I close Spotify web it stops the song completely and I am no longer able to play any songs on Spotify desktop once again.

I have tried:

• Logging out and into Spotify
• Logging out, restarting my computer, and logging back in
• Reinstalling Spotify completely
• Clearing cache
• Disabling/enabling hardware acceleration
• Checking if I have enough free memory (I do)
• Fiddling with proxy settings (still set to automatic)

[vze-dt1_jrw6i1]

Same problem being reported on different threads over last couple hours - all PC network tests check out fine - Spotify mobile & web are playing just fine, so it's the Windows app

[rukiikogi]

Experiencing the same issues, just to add 2 others:

- some playlists of mine will play but the majority will not. And among those that will play, if shuffle or smart shuffle are active then it will not play (I have no songs downloaded and this is still true once cache is cleared, reset, and re-install)

- while I can direct music playing on other devices from the desktop app, it will not connect if I try to change from mobile to desktop app

Seems to be fairly new and widespread given the most recent threads.

[Kamo38]

Plan

Premium

Country

US

Device

PC

Operating System

WINDOWS 10

My Question or Issue

My spotify has stopped working completely, I can play music on my phone and through the browser, however the Windows App doesn't play music at all. It shows that the songs are ready to play and aren't greyed out, however when I click play nothing happens. Fixes I've tried;

Clean reinstall using the download from the spotify website
Clean reinstall using the download from Windows Store
Clearing the cache
Changing Proxy settings
Changing playback settings
Checking for updates
Checking the hosts file
Enabling/Disabling Hardware acceleration
Restarting my PC before and after redownloading spotify
Deleting all spotify folders
Ending it with task manager
Playing a song on my phone then switching it to my computer
Changing windows compatibility mode

Nothing I've tried above works, I've been searching for hours to find a fix, however nothing seems to work.

[Combatting]

Seems to be spotifys side. Some people can play others cannot. I'm the latter. Can play through my phone though.

Done everything and checked permissions. Need to wait on Spotify. Looks like someones flicked the off switch smh. 

[adamwright_1989]

Same issue for me as well (Windows Store app). I also tried a clean install.

[angelitist]

spotify completely stopped playing anything. it started off only playing some playlists and not others and now it won’t play anything at all, the play bar is blank and no song will play at all except local files. i’ve checked the hosts file and it is not that.

Plan

Premium

Country

U.K

Device

PC

Operating System

Windows 10

[Lucke69]

Yup same, works on my phone but not on my pc

[ftl123]

I have the same problem using the desktop app on Ubuntu.

[ronalddumsfeld]

Same experience as the OP starting today.

Here's a strange one that might help with solving the isssue..or not.

I can play a podcast on my ipad and transfer control to my PC app.

The podcast plays on the PC fine.

But as soon as i try and play music.....Nothing again.

All control buttons either greyed out or unresponsive.

[MStanbrook]

That makes me even more suspicious of it being a DRM issue then. I'd guess they've pushed a new certificate to the desktop client, or not renewed an expired one.

[savsur]

Plan

Premium

Country

Indonesia

Device

PC

Operating System

Win 11

My Question or Issue

Spotify app wont play any music at all, except for podcast.

Following fixes i tried:

-Run as admin

-Clean re-install

-Host file

-Vpn

-Firewall

(New free account could play music, but using original premium account made it unplayable again)

[thezerg1989]

Plan

Premium

Country

Sweden

Device

Desktop PC

Operating System

Windows 11 Pro Version 23H2

My Question or Issue

hi i can't play any songs on the desktop app. i have tried to reinstall the app. changed the settings on windows and in the app. deactivated hardware acceleration. changed the quality of the stream and also tried to download the songs. none of the things i have tried works. whats going on?

[zJenx]

Hello!

I have the same issue and I did all the steps recommended. T.T

[savsur]

The issue is fixed suddenly while redownloading liked songs.

[ronalddumsfeld]

DRM false positive Yes. But -  I'm assuming this isn't happening to everybody otherwise there would have been an avalanche here rather than at most so far about 50 posts with the same condition.

What has made us different?

I think I may have left my PC on last night across the time when my SP rebooted and changed my IP?

Might that have had an effect? I'm cluching at straws here but I've tried everything on the regular solve a problem list to no effect at all.

[ronalddumsfeld]

Now fixed. Since the latest version is dated 8th Dec 2023 the problem must have been at their end.

[kaworu_bloodpaw]

Hey! Are y'all still having issues? I'm seeing many posts about the same issue, but there was never an Ongoing Issue report.

[Ivelina]

Hey there folks,

Thanks for bringing this to our attention and for all the details you've provided!

We can see that some of you are mentioning that you're back on track and that things are working again, that's great news!

However, if you're still experiencing issues with this on your desktop, let us know what Spotify version you're running, and we'll investigate this further.

Many thanks!