Issue with storage option switching from SD Card to internal

[haydnrb7]

Plan

Premium

Country

US 

Device

Moto X4

Operating System

Android Pie

My Question or Issue

 This happened with my last phone, Samsung S7 running Oreo (or whatever the most recent OS is) but it was fixed when I got the Moto X4. I like to keep a lot of songs downloaded offline because my service is terrible and I also spend a lot of time in the mountains. Before I I update my phone to the new Android Pie OS there was no problems. Now everytime I reset my phone I think spotify cannot see my SD card at first and tries to download all the music to its internal storage and I have to go back in and tell it to store it in the SD card. That is extremely annyoing but not the end of the world. What is really frustrating is that I think all of the downloaded songs are still on the SD card and just keep redownloading and taking up space. Eventually this will cause me to reformat the card which will be a major pain for me since I store a large amount of photos on there also. Is anyone else have this problem? I have already uninstalled and reinstalled the application so any other suggestions or help?

[haydnrb7]

Please look at what I think could be the problem (and possibly the solution):

I noticed that the SD card only mounts AFTER I unlock the first time after the boot. You can see it by the SD card icon who apears quickly at status bar just after the unlock. For security reasons, it make sense, since someone who stole the phone could try to load malicious software via external storage. Spotify service probably loads BEFORE the SD card mount, and then, like a mother who call the police when his son is 30 seconds late to come back home, it switches to the internal memory and starts to download all again. If the PIN is typed before the system boot, the SD card mount and when Spotify service loads, it can find the external storage. Works like a charm. 

This solution did not let Spotify devs off the hook, since many other apps that use external storage didn't present this issue at all.

SOLUTION:

Make sure, if you have a PIN or password set, to Android ask BEFORE the system boot.

Further information here:

https://community.spotify.com/t5/Android/Storage-switched-back-to-internal-at-every-reboot-I-ve-found-the/m-p/4714532

[PerryWerneck]

More than one year and this annoying bug is still here.

[rawndieveyea]

Hi, appends to my right now on Samsung Galaxy S20+ (Android 10, One UI 2.5) with Micro SD. I can publish debug info if needed, just ask for.

As everyone describe it in this thread, this is a huge pain. Please work on it 🙏

[franckgaga-ca]

Same bug on moto g6 play android Pie, 128 GB Samsung micro SDXC. I've tested all workaround and they does not work (clear cache and reinstall, install app on sd, secure boot, etc.). It's clearly a problem with devices that mount the SD card late in the boot process, after startup of the Spotify service.

Come on spotify, address this bug ! Your "download song to SD" feature is completely unusable right now, on my device and many others.

[stackoverflow64]

Same problem with Android 10... Spotify switches to internal storage after reboot and redownloads all the songs that had previously been downloaded to the SD card.  I've spent a lot of time trying to find a work-around, and contacted Spotify Support twice.  Nothing so far.  I have my fingers crossed that Spotify will releases a fix for this, but it's discouraging to see this problem has been around for a long time and still not addressed.

[enterquak]

I first solved it by locking my screen at startup long enough that spotify wasn't started during SD card mounting, over time it seemed fixed regardless what I did at boot. However, it has started again last week, and I am not sure if I have changed anything this time, and now it seems after a system restart, but spotify notices it only the first time when it is started. The maximum of 20GB traffic each time this happens (~1 USD on Amazon S3, probably less for spotify) is probably still much cheaper than having an engineer look at it, as long as their metrics cannot see that too many people quit the service due to that exact reason...

[esimioni]

I might have found a way around this issue.

First I cleaned all data and uninstalled the app as recommended.
After installing again and configuring Spotify to use the SD Card I have downloaded a playlist with 50 songs (not much, but enough to have time to see what Spotify is doing).
It downloaded correctly to the SD Card, then I restarted the phone and Spotify started downloading all over again to the Internal Storage, I waited for it to complete, then I went to the storage config of Spotify and changed again to SD Card. It copied all data to the SD Card.
After this process I have restarted the phone again and it retained the storage configuration and didn't try to download to the Internal Storage.

Time will tell if it really "fixes" the issue or if it was just a lucky coincidence.

[Therealdjdmoney]

I am having the same problem. Been a Spotify users for many years and this issue just started happening recently (last 2-3 weeks).

It's extremely frustrating. I've cancelled my subscription due to this. Not worth the $10/month anymore if this is constantly happening. 

[franckgaga-ca]

I have found a workaround ! It will be useful for the end of lockdown with my low dataplan 😀 !

My device is a moto g6 play running with Android Pie 9.0. I don't know if the settings are similar on another device/android version.

1. The SD card needs to be configured as Adoptable Storage. For me it's in "Settings -> Storage -> SD Card -> Menu -> Format as Internal". Note that this will format your SD card, so take a backup before doing that. Also note that Adoptable Storage implies that the content of your SD can only be read by your phone from now on.
2. Clear data/cache of Spotify and reinstall it.
3. Open the android App Info of Spotify and go to "Storage -> Change" and select your SD Card. You may need to activate "Force allow apps on external" in "Settings -> System -> Developer options" if the option is not there.
4. Wait for completion and that's it! You can downloads songs, they will be stored on your SD, and kept after a reboot. Why ? There is no longer a "Memory" setting in the Spotify app since the storage location is now handled by Android (the switching to internal is no longer possible) !

Hope it will be useful to somebody ! 🙂

edit : It does works, but Spotify is unbearably slow with this configuration. I may switch back to internal memory, this is way too annoying...

[Dacosja]

It seems the SD card needs time to mount before Spotify tries to manage it unsuccessfully right after the phone boots, which was causing it to use Device Storage instead. I installed a 3rd party app to restrict Spotify from auto-start and thought it was a proper workaround, but the issue still occurs.

[RichW001]

I have a Motog6 and it has this issue.  Does not happen for Netflix or Linked in Learning. Not sure what others are doing to overcome the issue.  Seems interesting that Spotify has this issue for awhile now.