Audio Glitching / Stuttering / Popping

[Stephen0vick]

Plan

Premium

Country

United States

Device

(iPhone 13 Pro Max)

Operating System

(iOS 18.1.1)

My Question or Issue

I have a strange issue with my Spotify where it skips when connected via Bluetooth and my iPhone. The audio will glitch and stutter. It becomes extremely bad gradually, but the increase is rapid. This problem ONLY occurs when I have the app actively open and my phone is connected to a Bluetooth device. If I leave the app open it will begin the glitch within one minute and then get intense before a single song can finish. The only solution I’ve came up with is clicking play and then swiping out of the app. I can still skip songs from the iPhone drop down menu, but if I want to select a new playlist I have to open the app, select the playlist, close the app because the glitching begins, then re-open the app, click play, and swipe out the app. The problem persists regardless of my WiFi connection, phone battery, Bluetooth device, or any other connection issue that would commonly cause problems. I haven’t found any regular way to resolve the issue and trust me, I’ve looked. It’s so much that the issue becomes a major problem, I would just like to be able to surf through my Spotify app while listening to music without problems.

[Yordan]

Hey there, @Stephen0vick.

Thanks for reaching out!

Does the glitching occur when you're navigating through the app? Does it stop if you don't do anything?

You mentioned using multiple Wi-Fi networks, but could you check if the issue would persist when using cellular data? It's also worth performing a clean reinstall of the app - this will rule out any potential issues with corrupted cache and ensure you're running the latest version of Spotify available.

Something else that comes to mind is checking if the would occur with another account - you can ask someone who uses Spotify to log in to their account to see if they'd experience the same behavior.

Let us know how it goes. Cheers 🤘

[Stephen0vick]

Good Morning,

Thanks for the reply! The glitching begins only if I stay navigating within the app. If I swipe out within around 20 seconds, the glitching will never start, unless I open the app again for too long. Same issue occurs while using cellular data as well.

I tried a clean uninstall and the problem persisted. Like I said, it’s not the worst thing ever or anything, it just gets irritating when playing music for a group of people. Also, it doesn’t do it in my car

[MihailY]

Hey @Stephen0vick,

Thanks for your response.

Can you also check whether this happens in Offline mode and in the web player? What if you stay on the Home screen without touching anything?

Testing with another account will also be very helpful in narrowing down the root cause of this issue.

Keep us posted.

[New user]

i’ve tried multiple different speakers and had the same problem and multiple different phones with my same Spotify account and had the same problem.

[Stephen0vick]

Good Afternoon!

Apologies for the delay, but both of those work. Very strange that those are solutions to the issue. I’m happy it doesn’t happen when I’m in my car and I’ll continue to use the app regularly otherwise. I have all my music downloaded so it’s not too much of an issue to play offline. Hopefully this might get fixed anyways. I appreciate your help and if you’d like me to try any other solutions let me know!

[Stephen0vick]

Forgot to do the different account thing, but same issue occurs aside from the offline and web player. Also, staying on the Home Screen doesn’t change anything either.

[MihailY]

Hey @Stephen0vick,

Thanks for getting back to us with this info. We're happy to hear that for now we have a working solution!

The web player streams at a slightly lower quality than the app and I'm guessing you've chosen the Normal audio quality setting for downloading music, so if you're streaming at a higher bitrate it's possible the connection is being overloaded as suggested in this Apple thread. Try changing the streaming quality to a lower setting and see if you get the same result.

It's also worth checking if the stuttering is present when using a different streaming service. If you have a watch connected to your phone, try turning it off temporarily.

Let us know how it goes!

[NadineNadineNadine]

Mine does the glitching, stuttering and then speeding up as well - usually whenever I am playing music in my car. 

[Pugmartin]

I have the same issue and not impressed at all. It wasn’t there previously - same car, same watch being used, same account, same radio, same … me - so why all of a sudden? I’m ready to cancel my family plan on the back of it unless it’s sorted out very soon. Not impressed 

[Eddie79]

Plan

Free/Premium

Country

Germany 

Device

Ipjone 15 pro

Operating System

iOS 18.3.2

My Question or Issue

I have sporadic noises during playing any kind of music in my two different cars. I use one with a AUX cable and in the another car via Bluetooth. It sounds like a Frequenz disturb for 1-2 seconds.  sometimes after 10 minutes or faster.

 

[bethanymulkern]

I have Spotify Premium and I listen on an iPhone XR with iOS 18.3.2 in the United States. 

When I listen in the car, regardless of cell phone coverage, Spotify skips and glitches at random intervals. I have tried all of the suggested fixes: clean install, cleared Spotify cache, turned off Gapless Playback and Automix, and I have the Audio playback on High. This only happen with Cellular Streaming. I have no issues when it's on WiFi or using the web player. 

[bethanymulkern]

I don’t understand why this was moved when I stated I have tried all recommended fixes, including the ones mentioned in this thread. I reviewed this specific thread prior to posting and didn’t find anything helpful. 

[bethanymulkern]

So this is what Spotify calls "support"? I still don't have a resolution to my problem, no one from Spotify Support has replied to my post other than to move it to a thread that I've already reviewed and have not found helpful, I have no one to contact directly, and I'm paying how much a month for a family plan? Time to check out other options, I guess.

[neyer]

Hey everyone,

I've been experiencing a really frustrating issue with Spotify in my car, and I’m wondering if anyone else has encountered this.

For years, I’ve been able to connect my iPhone to my car’s Bluetooth system without any problems and listen to music seamlessly. However, for the past few months, I’ve been experiencing frequent stuttering and interruptions in the connection.

After closely monitoring the issue, I noticed that every time the connection starts to stutter, I check my Bluetooth settings and see random devices, like "Galaxy Note ... from ...", listed as "Connected". I have no control over these devices, and I can’t remove them manually. The only way to disconnect them is by completely closing Spotify. Once I do that, my music plays normally again.

I’ve done a lot of research but haven’t found anyone else reporting this exact issue. It’s incredibly annoying because my phone keeps randomly connecting to other devices while driving, which disrupts my music playback.

I recently found a setting in Spotify called "Social Media Features -> Allow access to Jam via Bluetooth", and I suspect this might be causing the issue. This only happens with Spotify—when I tested the same setup with SoundCloud, I had no connection problems at all.

Here’s what I’ve already tried to fix it:

• Restarted Spotify

• Reinstalled Spotify

• Disabled Spotify Connect

• Restarted my phone

• Deleted and re-paired my car’s Bluetooth connection

Unfortunately, none of these solutions have worked.

Has anyone else experienced this? Does anyone know a fix? I’d really appreciate any help, as I’ve been a happy Spotify user for years, but this issue is making it hard to enjoy my music while driving.

Thanks in advance!

Plan

Premium

Country

Switzerland

Device

iPhone 12 Pro Max

Operating System

iOS 18.3.1

[Stephen0vick]

After a month or two or so, things have gotten worse for me. It began to happen in my car after the most recent Spotify update that also cause the “que ignoring” issue. The glitching happens even faster now as well with speakers. I’m not the only one having this issue either, it’s all of my friends on multiple speakers. I’m getting quite annoyed of this problem persisting with no ACTUAL solution. That offline solution is an inconvenient temporary patch and a waste of my time as an avid music listener.

[Stephen0vick]

The streaming quality idea seems cool until you realize this didn’t use to happen, so why would it be an issue now?

The stuttering only exists on Spotify.

disconnecting my Apple watch did not fix it. My friend who is also experiencing this issue does not own an Apple Watch.

[MihailY]

Hey folks,

Apologies for the radio silence the last couple of weeks.

We'd like to report this to our tech team, so please let us know the following (whichever you haven't already):

• The device model, OS version and current Spotify version of your phone.
• The model of the device(s) you're connecting to.
• A detailed description of the issue and if possible, a short video of it.
• The exact steps to reproduce it and the circumstances under which it's not present.

We'll be on the lookout for your replies.

[bethanymulkern]

I have an iPhone XR iOS 18.3.2 Spotify version 9.0.30.604

I connect via Bluetooth to my car's system. My vehicle is a 2013 Honda Civic and the stereo system is the stock model original to the vehicle. As previously stated, the song or podcast I'm listening to skips or stops playing altogether regardless of my cell phone coverage at the time. I have tried all recommended fixes and nothing resolves the issue. I would note that I have a free trial version of Apple Music and have had no issues with skipping or glitches, and I have been using Apple Music exclusively for about a week now. When I switched to Spotify during a drive to test it out, it started skipping within a couple of minutes so I switched back to Apple Music without issue. 

[Karofalbala]

I have the exact same problem and it is only with Spotify that this happens.