Podcasts pause after ads have played

[Elena]

Hey folks!

We've been getting reports that  the app freezes/pauses/slows down the playback when listening to podcasts. This behavior happens after an ad has played and it's often resolved with restarting the app/the device.

[J3ff_m]

Hi, I have logged out and logged back in twice with no success.  I do have an SD card so I removed it, rebooted phone, deleted Spotify app, rebooted phone.  Reinstalled Spotify app, played JRE episode 1182 and as always, the podcast restarted immediately after playing 2 advertisements at about the 6 min 45s mark.  So neither of these solutions have worked.  Let me know what next steps are.  I am not a free user, I pay for family plan monthly and this is unacceptable.  Thanks.

[J3ff_m]

Oh I have also played the podcast on the Spotify Windows app on my Surface laptop and I do not get the restart issue, it works fine.  To be clear, this is not a practical solution for me, I am not going to use my laptop when streaming Spotify in my car.

Thanks.

[Eni]

Hi @J3ff_m, 

Thanks for getting back in touch and letting us know that. 

No worries, there are also a few other things we can try. Could you make sure that Spotify has all necessary permissions enabled?

1. Open your Settings menu.

2. Scroll to the bottom to find Spotify and open the app settings.

3. Enable everything you see.

It's also a good idea to exclude the app from any Battery optimization software that might be active on your smartphone.

Lastly, we suggest that you check if the OS of your phone has any pending updates. 

Keep us posted on how it goes.

[J3ff_m]

OK so I went into settings for the Spotify app and none of the permissions were turned on.  I can confirm that when I installed the app, I was not prompted to turn on these permissions.  So upon turning them on, the podcasts are now continuing after an ad as expected which is great.  So this has seemed to have fixed the problem.

However, before closing out this ticket I would like to know why this is the case as I suspect there is still a bug here.  You don't need access to my camera, contacts, files, or microphone in order to create a pointer for a piece of specific media.  This can be done within the app itself and wouldn't need to modify files or invoke my camera or microphone,  As a rule I actually don't just grant permissions unless I can understand why an app needs to invoke the camera or my phone.  Can you please look into this as well?

Also, I had to write this out twice as once again I got an error when I hit the post button and it lost everything I wrote out.  I'm writing this on my PC Chrome browser, not my mobile browser.

[J3ff_m]

Further update.  I have turned off each of the permissions individually and it turns out the 1 permission that recreates the issue every time is access to Contacts.  I can turn off camera, microphone, and files without the problem occurring.  As soon as I turn off contacts the problem comes back.  The podcast will restart after an ad.

This doesn't make any sense to me.  I can not think of any correlation between the streaming of a podcast and playing of an ad, with the native contacts store on my device.  I am happy to provide any more proof or screen recordings if you need them.

I have also installed Spotify in BlueStacks which is an Android emulator for PC.  Basically it creates an Android phone on your PC.  I can confirm that I do not have this problem when all permissions are denied.  When I installed Spotify in the Android emulator it also did not ask me to change any permissions.  So they were all off by default.

[1216172819]

I agree with many of these folks: I pay for Premium, so I should not have to listen to ads that interrupt  my podcasts. This is especially frustrating when I have to listen to the ad for the new podcast with Ricky Gervais and Sam Harris, two mean and hateful men who should not be given a platform. At the very least, I should be able to say “this ad is not relevant” or “this ad is offensive” so I don’t have to continue being offended by hearing their irrelevant giggling. 

[bartobri]

Like so many before me, i tried to reply and hir and error and lost my original response. I have a feeling this thread would be much longer of this community software actually worked properly.

I too have the podcast restart issue after ads play. Does anyone from support want to comment on why granting access to contacts fixed this issue? Cause that makes no sense. Giving access unnecessarily to our private information is not an acceptable fix. Let me know when this is fixed such that i dont have to grant access to completely unnecessary personal resources to listen to a podcast that initially plays just fine until there is an ad.

[J03YK]

Phone: Google Pixel 5A with 5g

Hello. I'm having the same issue with ads on the JRE podcast with it restarting after an add break. This has been happening to me since the podcast has been put onto Spotify. Ive been able to replicate the issue on my account along with a few other people's accounts in addition to 3 different android phones. I've had issues on hour+ long Last Podcast on the Left stop playing after an ad break as well and it's very frustrating. I was able to screen record the most recent issue and uploaded it to YouTube. Skip to 5:40 to see the ad break stop and then restart the podcast. I've opened up a technical chat and sent over the info there as well.

https://youtu.be/qbFuYBaApCA

[MrHilter]

Just started listening to the JRE podcast again a few days ago and im amazed how this issue still exists. Im trying to listen to #1733 with snoop dogg and there have been two ad breaks already after 53minutes an both reliably restart the podcast... unbelievable

Of course I tried all the fixes, wiped the cache, reinstalled the app, yadda yadda...

I cant believe that I am actually paying money for this...

Listening in Germany on a Samsung Galaxy S9 with Android 10 and all the available Updates

[MrHilter]

Disabling battery optimization for the Spotify app fixed the second ad at 53min and 34s

[been__jammin]

I've been experiencing this issue ever since the ads started playing on their own track (rather than being integrated into the podcast audio). I've reinstalled the app probably a dozen times, check for updates daily, restart my phone daily, cleared cache, have all permissions enabled, etc., but the issue always seems to return. In reviewing the moderator posts, it seems that there is a tendency to repeat the same non-solutions (clear cache, restart app) ad-nauseum rather than accept the fact that there is likely a software bug in the app. Surprisingly, a moderator wanted to close the issue due to a lack of new posts. The lack of new posts doesn't mean the issue has been resolved, it just means the users  are waiting for a response from Spotify that a bug fix is in the works or for novel troubleshooting tips (not the cliche non-advice mentioned earlier). 

I am using a Pixel 5 running Android 12.

[Jameelk17]

This is ridiculous, I see lots of try this and try that by Spotify. All tried obviously. The problem is not what we do. It’s what you do with the app. Your adverts are kicking us out of  the podcasts we’re listening to or watching. On various different platforms. So the problem is the app. Fix it!! 

[KGUNZ]

yeah i am absolutely not typing out the whole message again to simply say this issue is still a big deal and super disappointing.

got "Exception ID: 37FF74E2" when i tried posting and lost everything. desktop and iphone podcast reset at ad on JRE thats the only thing youre getting out of me. same everyone else. fix it 

[thereedzilla]

Elena, 

Is there a fix in the works, or are you suggesting that it is normal behavior that we should have to restart the app in the middle of a podcast because an ad breaks it? The fact that this is even a question for "ad-free" Premium users seems crazy. 

[ClaudeP]

Is there any fix for this yet?

Having the same or very similar issue in September 2023. 

Have Spotify premium on an S23 Ultra. When listening to JRE an ad starts up without pausing the podcast so I hear the podcast and ad at the same time. If I hit pause it will pause the ad, but the podcast continues in the background.  No control over the podcast audio. Have to stop the app to get it to stop playing. Then when restarting the app it wants to start the next episode. 

What is the solution here? 

It seems this has been a problem for years with no fix...

[Cj213]

Please stop playing advertising when listening to podcast. On video podcast I listen to with my screen off, it turns off the podcasts and breaks the app. Closing it and restarting doesn’t fix it. Nor so far has deleting and reinstalling the app.