[iOS] Cover art + track title is "stuck" on the first track played on BMW head unit

[drftorres]

Track titles and cover art is not displayed correctly on BMW (2015) when playing through Bluetooth or the USB interface in the center console.

Symptom: Music plays and it is possible to switch tracks, but the cover art and track title is "stuck" on the first track played. It played great in the past and playing well with other music apps.

Device

(iPhone Xs) Running version 13.3.1

Car: BMW X6M 2015

[counting6]

I'm at the end of my rope with this Spotify issue as well. I'm considering
Youtube Music or Apple.

[gera9319]

I made the switch to Apple Music last summer. I loved Spotify, but even then the issue was present for more than six months. It’s been over a year and still no fix. Apple Music gives you so much more functionality even without CarPlay such as being able to scroll through the titles on your speedometer and not just skip the song.

[Kaviator]

@counting6you can get 3 months of Apple Music for free and see if that works for you. I tried 2 days ago, it works in my car and doesn't have that bug. Also, @gera9319 is correct that you get to scroll through the titles from your steering wheel controls which is nice. The bottom line is that I gave Spotify one year of patience to fix a very simple bug. I wasn't a life-altering feature, I didn't really NEED it, but I was paying every month for the software. It's just something that used to work and they broke it through their update one year ago. I felt it was bad business practice as they took (some of) their customers for granted.

[counting6]

I agree with this not being a life altering issue. BUT we are paying for
the service. As such we expect it to work as it should. I feel Spotify has
neglected it's paying customers by not addressing this issue in a one year
time frame. I find that unreasonable and poor business practice.

[rhyvve]

Having an issue as well - 2018 BMW x2 with iDrive. Was just at the dealer last week to get the latest BMW system software loaded. Spotify app in iDrive is not updating album artwork when changing songs. You can skip songs backwards and forwards, but the album art will stay or not load, and update only after the 2nd or 3rd song skip. Running iOS 14.4, iPhone XR, Spotify version 8.6.4.1247. This has worked completely fine in the past....echoing the sentiments here, this should work. Why are we going backwards?

[Ddpd]

Same, bmw 1 series 2015, I think I will install older apk

[Dave9808]

Oh my god guys, I get it to work.

Do you want to know the solution, Spotify is the worst streaming service that exists. 

I just deleted spotify and Im using Apple Music now. It costs the same even for families, the sound quality is better and it works perfectly in my BMW. I can even switch between my playlists in my BMW, i love it.

Bye spotify i waited for a year now, its the worst service there exists, even Amazon music works in BMW 😄 

[Katerina]

Hey folks,  

We haven't had any updates for you all in a while and in the interest of keeping this thread updated for other users stumbling upon it, we'll go ahead and mark it as Won't Fix for now. 

Rest assured that we've passed on your reports to the teams around this. This is a very specific issue to this particular device setup with BMW head units and seems to be affecting only a smaller subset of users. However, if you're experiencing something similar but on a different head unit, we'd recommend starting a separate thread here so we can take a look. 

Keep in mind that this doesn't eliminate that a future update of the app could improve things for you, so keeping the app always updated is a great idea.

We do appreciate you taking the time to add your comments in this thread! If we have any further updates for you regarding this, we'll make sure to share them in this thread with you.

[Ariobimosw]

[RESOLVED]

I had the same problem last month. I think we can’t blame spotify for this case. I just resolved this issue by updating the software of the bmw headunit.

Let me give you the tutorial : 

1. go to bmw.com/update

2. Input your Bmw VIN

3. download the file and save it to any usb flash drive 

4. (In your Bmw) insert the usb flash drive (inside the arm rest storage compartment)

5. (Headunit menu) go to settings —> software update —> install software

6. follow the intructions and you’re done

[Amel_]

No, updating the BMW software doesn’t solve it.
If it worked in your case, you probably had a different problem.
It is Spotify’s fault as it worked for everybody until a certain Spotify update was released.

Recently they announced that they won’t fix it, so we‘ll have to switch to Apple Music (already done) or buy a new BMW lol.