[Android][Connect] Bring back support for removed BMW Connected Drive Integration

[kay0002]

Share this with everyone you know and ask them to vote!

Spotify Integration with BMW Idrive 6 has always been sporadic and not all advertised features work. The latest Spotify versions 8.5.68.904 and 8.5.6.9.934 have bugs and the App does not appear in IDrive at all. The pervious version of Spotify was somewhat unreliable as I had to occasionally repair my phone with the car. I can no longer see the Spotify App in my BMW media list. 

I can only listen to spotify from the bmw bluetooth audio option. 

I've tried pairing an iPhone and the app appears on iDrive. For my android issue I deleted the App data and cache of both Bmw ConnectedDrive and Spotify app. I also unpaird the bluetooth connection between my smartphone car. Lastly, I uninstalled both Spotify and the BMW Apps. Nothing works.

Additionally, it would be great if my Playlist order in my car matched the order on the phone. For example, although my phone app is sorted alphabetically, my car would only show playlists in the order of what was most recently created.

Who else thinks Spotify needs to get it together and provide a quality app that integrates with iDrive?

Fix the Spotify Bug!

[jlarr]

I had no idea this was a thing. Worked on my 2020 X3 with no issues, then was fine on my 2022 X3 until about 2 weeks ago, it would go offline intermittently. I thought I was in a bad cell area. Then this week I could not get it to work at all. uninstalled Spotify and my BMW app on my phone  and logged out of Spotify on BMW, still says it's not online. Spotify support confirms that it's been deprecated and no longer supported. I can even sign back into the Spotify app in the car now. The Android Auto version isn't as good. Please pass this on to as many BMW forums as possible and get folks to vote this up. only 1500 on this topic won't cut it.

[Gentoo87]

I was so excited to run my Spotify app on a new to me BMW I purchased. As a long term subscriber this hurt...

[puddingftw]

Hallo,

ich bitte um die Behebung dieses Problems. Leider habe ich das selbe Problem mit der Spotify App, Musik lässt sich zwar bei meinem BMW F31 (Bj. 2014) abspielen, aber ohne die Titelanzeige, was sehr gefährlich sein kann und außerdem illegal, wenn man darauf hin sein Smartphone zum umschalten/weiterschalten der Musik benutzen muss.

[davidtelfer]

IF you have the MyBMW app installed, and also choose to install the AAIDrive app (from Google Play) then Spotify (or Deezer and some others) become integrated back into the iDrive system again (iDrive 4 &5/6 at least).  This includes album art and searching (does not work well on Deezer). It works over wireless connections to the car, so no need to plug in.  This feature has now become critical because OnlineEntertainment has been axed overnight by BMW leaving the iDrive entertainment systems on cars a young as 4 years old dead in the water.... i mean bluetooth connections with no album art and only next/prev is a bit 1990's and BMWdont seem to give a stuff.

[Geezacalledjim]

Hello bud.

Thanks for this info I appreciate it and would like to give it a try. Could
you give me some more info on it as I'm a bit dubious about putting my
Spotify details into a 3rd party app and getting hacked.
Any more info would be gratefully received

Thanks
Jim

[Phuzz]

Jim, I understand your reluctance to enter credentials in random places, very wise.

However, AAidrive is using "oauth" for this, if you look closely at the screen prompting for Spotify creds, you should see it is actually an in app browser tab (at the top you should see the Spotify URL). The way oauth works is that an app does not take your creds, it directs you via a browser to logon (to Spotify), and gets back a token (that allows the app to play to tunes on your account. If you have used Alexa (or pretty much any website where you can login with Google/apple/Facebook), that basically used the same tech to solve the problem of site A not getting to see creds for site B.

The other thing I would add is that AAidrive is open source, you can find the code for it on GitHub (admittedly not everyone can understand the code but it is public), and if you look at the issues tab there you can see the way the author conducts himself, and you will see he is a top bloke 

[Geezacalledjim]

I've had a play with this app and it's **bleep** brilliant. Thanks for putting
me onto this and thanks for putting my concerns to bed. I would highly
recommend this to anyone who is/was on the same situation as me. This now
makes my android experience with my 2017 BMW what it should have been all
along. Is there something in the app that allows decent screen sharing
like android auto do you know?

Thanks again for your help so far I will have to spread the word.
Only concern now is if the app get shuts down!? Is this a potential risk?

Jim

[davidtelfer]

No screen sharing as far as I am aware... I think the link via bmw app does not have the bandwidth (I seem to remember reading about something in development but it wasn't working very well so probably best to stteer clear)

Glad to hear your getting on with it as far as spotify goes. I also get email and WhatsApp to appear in idrive using it, and it will read them out and allow you to reply too. You can invoke an assistant (google, alexa or bixby) if you don't have alexa support natively in your idrive. Not sure how good that is... I can't get google to work properly as it never seems to speak through the car even though it listens, but I do have alexa in my 2019 435xd so I don't use the aaidrive app for that.

All the best
Dave

[alex775]

Simple solution l, just cancel Spotify and get Apple Music. Functionally works out the box and don’t have to mess around with third party apps.

[Beanaron]

This needs to return, I’ve nearly had several crashes already trying to change tracks on my phone!