Song Order Within a Playlist Keeps Changing

[fivethirtyam]

Plan

Premium

Country

USA

Device

MacBook Pro/iPhone7P

Operating System

OSX High Sierra/iOS

My Question or Issue

I listen to the Friday Cratediggers Spotify Playlist every week to pick out what I like. Over the past couple of weeks, the order of songs will randomly change as I am listening (some tracks I haven't listened to yet will jump to the top of the playlist, while some I've already listened to will go to the bottom), this makes it hard to keep track of which songs I have already sorted through. I have noticed the same problem while listening on my iPhone as well. Please advise on whether this issue can be fixed. Thank you.

[MacWehr]

I'm still seeing songs move around frequently in the Energy Booster: Pop playlist by Spotify.

This is how the song movement works:

I'll start listening to the playlist and this will be the initial song order:

Song 1

Song 2

Song 3

Song 4

Song 5

I'll be listening to Song 4 and after just a few minutes of playing the list, the playlist order shuffles and the new order is:

Song 1

Song 2

Song 4

Song 3

Song 5

So after Song 4 finishes playing, the next song that plays is Song 3, not Song 5, as the list's original order has slightly changed. 

If I exit the playlist and then re-enter it, I'll see the songs jump around to their new places.

This happens on both Android and iPad.

Then within a half hour the song order will change again:

Song 5

Song 1

Song 2

Song 3

Song 4

So if Song 5 is currently playing, once it finishes, due to another change to the playlist's order, it'll go to Song 1 next instead of moving to Song 6.

Due to this frequent jumping around of songs, can't get through the playlist.

[Ver]

Hey folks,

Thanks for reporting this to us.

We're going to need a bit more info so this can be investigated.

Could you provide us with the following info:

• Device + OS version
• Exact Spotify version
• How often do the playlists update?
• The URIs of the playlists.

Once we have that, we will pass it on to the relevant team, who will look further into it.

Thanks!

[MacWehr]

@Ver,

Thanks for following up.

Here's the info you requested.

Devices and Versions

iPad, iOS v. 14.0.1 using Spotify v. 8.9.26.1174

Samsung S10, Android 11 using Spotify v. 8.6.26.897

Playlists

Only see the frequent playlist order updates on playlists created by Spotify, but not all Spotify-created playlists.  So far I haven't experienced the issue on playlists I've created.

Here's a Spotify-created playlist that has frequent song order changes:

Energy Booster: Pop

open dot spotify dot com/playlist/37i9dQZF1DX0vHZ8elq0UK?si=7399c31ffdfc4aba

Here's a Spotify-created playlist that so far I haven't experienced frequent song order changes:

Hit Rewind

open dot spotify dot com/playlist/37i9dQZF1DX0s5kDXi1oC5?si=81a9e456739b4b52

Frequency of Song Order Changes

Frequency of song order changes varies from 1-3 times hourly.  It only involves a few songs.  One song might move forward or back in the playlist order.  Or a couple of songs might swap places.

[MacWehr]

@Ver,

I have another playlist created by Spotify that exhibits the frequent song order changes.  I have screen captures to illustrate.  My device and Spotify version info are in my earlier posts above.

The playlist is 10 Summers You Won't Forget.

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/37i9dQZF1DWXpyNlpWQwux?si=248acf3a2c904bea

If you look, at 11:33 am phone time, the song that was playing, No Promises by Cheat Codes and Demi Lovato, was after the song Latch by Disclosure and Sam Smith. 

However, at 11:34 am, just a minute later, No Promises jumped up to an earlier position on the same playlist, just after American Kids by Kenny Chesney. 

Also, if you notice, Can't Stop This Feeling by Justin Timberlake moves off the the same highlighted portion of the playlist. 

While these 2 songs changed positions on the playlist, the rest of the playlist maintained the same order.

11:33 am11:34 am

This all happened only 30 minutes after another playlist order change.  Meant to Be by Bebe Rexha and Florida Georgia Line went from 2 songs after How Deep Is Your Love by Calvin Harris to immediately following How Deep Is Your Love.

11:07 am A11:07 am B

[Popsicle_90]

Today (6/10/21) and two weeks prior. The spotify on the desktop and IOS devices doesn't work. What I mean by that is, it plays a song and a few seconds in it plays a song not even on my playlists. I logged in and out, removed the App and installed it, cleaned my desktop for cookies ect and still the problem persists.  @Mario 

[Ver]

Hey folks,

Thanks for the info 🙂

 @MacWehr We appreciate you taking the time to share your info with us so we can investigate this further.

@Popsicle_90 It sounds like you might be experiencing a different issue. It's a good idea to post in a separate board so we can look into this further. You can also include the troubleshooting steps that you've tried so far.

[Xenia]

Hey there folks,

It's been a while since we received any new contacts or reports, so we're now moving this thread back to the help boards since we're having difficulties replicating this issue on our end.

If you're still having trouble with this, make sure to comment with the info we asked for and we'll be happy to take another look.

Cheers!

[Kejml]

I just found out there are "Deep DIve" playlists by Spotify, that are about 35 hours long... SOund perfect for a working week or two, but because of the constant reordering of songs during a single day, it's really annoying, exactly as @MacWehr  describes, I'm constantly hearing some songs multiple times and some are skipped.

[Jeremy]

Hi there @Kejml,

Thank you for your reply in this thread.

It would be great if you can let us know what troubleshooting steps you've done that's been provided in the thread? This will help us narrow down troubleshooting steps for you in our next reply.

We'll keep an eye out for your reply 🙂

Take care!

[Kejml]

Hello, I don't know what troubleshooting I can do. Here are two screenshots of the same Spotify curated playlist, one taken on Friday, one today (Monday). All the songs are added to the playlist two months ago, but the order is different!

So when if I was listening to the playlist on Friday in your (curated) order, I got to song number 7 (Cosmik Debris) (see the first screenshot), paused, and continue when I left off on Monday, now Cosmik Debris is song number 2! (see the second screenshot) And after Cosmik Debris, I'll get to listen to some songs, I already heard before the reshuffle.

And this happens all the time, even during the one day 😞

[aiwentari]

3/2/2022 - Still experiencing this 😞 makes it really hard to listen to longer playlists if every time you try to jump in where you left off you end up repeating some songs, while there are others you missed completely...

[aiwentari]

Here is a playlist I was listening to (Top Hits of 2014). You can see I am on song 61, "Am I Wrong". Using the Chrome developer tools I was able to see the JSON that your API server returns. "Am I Wrong" is appropriately item 60 in the array.

Then, I refreshed the page. "Am I Wrong" now moved down to number 71 in the list (and is indeed return as item 70 in the array).

EDIT TO ADD: I'm using Spotify from within the browser, if that wasn't obvious from the screenshots...

[Farmstrong115]

Adding to this thread.. listening to fully-up-to-date Spotify on iPhone 12 pro. This is happening on all Spotify curated playlists I listen to several times an hour. It's impossible to listen fully through these playlists when any given song you are listening to might jump 10 spots earlier in the queue.. you just end up listening to the same handful of songs over and over again.

If it makes a difference, I'm listening to the "Levitate" playlist. I could post similar screenshots to those above which show how the order is scrambling every few minutes if helpful, but it doesn't seem like anyone from Spotify is really engaging with this problem anyway.. 

[Farmstrong115]

Jeremy it would be great if y'all could help investigate this issue. I think the users above have provided all of the information we can access as listeners. All of the standard procedure (reinstall, clear cache, etc) hasn't resolved the problem. 

[CarlosE]

Hi everybody,

Thanks for reaching out to the Community.

In order to check further, could you confirm the OS version and Spotify version installed on the devices where you're having this issue? Also, let us know if this happens only with playlists generated by Spotify.

We'll be on the lookout for your reply. 

[aiwentari]

I have only seen it happen on playlists generated by Spotify. As already mentioned above, I am using the Web version of Spotify. I'm using Google Chrome Version 99.0.4844.84 (Official Build) (64-bit). 

[Vasil]

Hey @aiwentari,
 

Thanks for the update!
 

We'll wait out the responses from the others and hopefully we'll then be able to narrow down the issue so that we can investigate further.

For everyone else, please do let us know your device, OS and Spotify version and check if this happens only on Spotify-created playlists on your ends as well.
 

Much appreciated!

@Farmstrong115
@Kejml

[Farmstrong115]

iPhone 12 Pro

iOS 15.4.1

Spotify app 8.7.20

I've only noticed the issue on Spotify curated playlists

[Yordan]

Hi everyone,

Thank you for the replies so far.

Our internal teams have taken a look at this and have confirmed that it's expected behavior. The track order of all algorithmic playlists curated by Spotify may change occasionally when you relaunch them.

Hope this clears things up. The Community is always here if there's anything else you need assistance with.
 

[blabarth]

Hi everyone, I have noticed some people have issues with their Daily Mix being refreshed. That is not my issue, however, I found out that after launching my mix, songs order end up moving after a few titles have been played. I remain in the same mix music style category but the songs are being played in the order they were supposed to be. Any idea as to why? does the mis evolve as you like songs along and so on ? thanks a lot of your feedback and if you face the same case (I don't want to call it an issue as this might not be one)