Opening Spotify app on ios pauses or interrups other media playback.

[stQ]

Plan

Premium

Country

Sweden

Device

IPhone 12 Mini

Operating System

IOS 15.1.1

Issue

Since recently, opening the spotify application on ios results in any other media playback from other apps, such as apple music, bandcamp, soundcloud, pod caster etc to pause.

Efficiently making it impossible to browse spotify while listening to playback from other applications.

Kind of of a deal breaker for me ...

[Alex]

Hey @stQ,

Thanks for reaching out about this in the Community!

Could you try toggling Background app reftesh On/ Off from your phone's settings and check if that makes a difference.

Keep us posted on how you get on.

[stQ]

Can’t say that it made any difference for me 😕

Reinstalled app, rebooted phone again as well. 

[CarlosE]

Hey @stQ,

Thanks for your reply.

Can you let us know if this happens while having your phone connected to an external device through Bluetooth or any other type of connection?

Additionally, let us know if this also happens when the Spotify app is on Offline Mode.

We'll be on the lookout.

[stQ]

Hi mate,

It does happen ( pauses other media playback ) without any external device connected, as well as when using Airplay or Bluetooth.

It happens if i put spotify in offline mode, and doesn't seem to make a difference if airplane mode is enabled or not.

edit: typo

Br

[CarlosE]

Hey @stQ,

Thanks for your reply.

Could you try logging out from your Spotify account, restarting your phone, and logging back in?

If nothing changes, can you try on a different iPhone to see if this behavior persists?

It's also worth checking that there aren't any optimization settings that might be interfering with this.

Keep us posted.

[errrrrrrr]

This issue began happening for me yesterday, too. I have always been (very) annoyed by the way Spotify automatically starts playing if you open the app when connected to a bluetooth device. However, in the past if I was listening to something else and opened Spotify, I was able to stop whatever Spotify intrusively started playing and go back to what I was listening to, and then go back into Spotify so I could browse or whatever. BUT NOW the Spotify app will not allow any other app (I've tried several) to play any audio if the Spotify app is on screen. I have been a Spotify subscriber for many years, but this will be the final straw if this issue isn't resolved soon.

[stQ]

I don't have access to an other iPhone, 

logging in and out doesn’t does not change this behavior. 

Not sure what kind of optimizations your referring to. 

Br

[Jeremy]

Hi there @stQ,

Thank you for your reply.

Can you let us know if the same happens vice-versa, i.e. listening to Spotify or any other app then opening another audio app stops the playback?

It would also be great if we can get a screen recording so that we can have a closer look directly from your end.

We'll keep an eye out for your reply.

Take care!

[stQ]

It doesn’t happen vice-vera, for any of the other apps I use for playback.

[MafeG]

Hi @stQ,

Thank you for your updates and patience with this. 

Can you log in with another account, such as a friend's or a family member's to see if the issue persists? Alternatively, you can create a free account here, just make sure you're logged out of your own account before creating a new one.  

Also, please don't forget to share with us the screen recording showing how the issue develops. This will help us keep investigating.

We'll be on the lookout.

[stQ]

It doesn’t pause with free account. 

However, I’m not sure how consistent it is, defiantly harder to reproduce anyway. 

Cant do screen recording with apple music, because apple mutes music while recording, not spotify though 😑

Br

[MafeG]

Hi @stQ,

Thank you for running those tests. 

Since the issue isn't reproducing in the new account, then we suggest you contact our folks from Customer Support who can take a deeper look into your account in case there's any corrupted information. Here is the link.

Let us know if you have any questions.

[RecreationalSQL]

I have this same issue, and it appeared in the same time frame as the original poster (last week or two). I frequently play media from other apps and radios and add songs i find there to playlists on spotify by searching for them as they play. Now playback will stop whenever the spotify app is opened on the device streaming the media, either my ipad and iphone.

[Elena]

Hey @RecreationalSQL,

Welcome to the Community and thanks for reaching out to us!

Could you confirm that you've tested the aforementioned troubleshooting steps? Feel free to share what additional troubleshooting you've done so far so we avoid repeating the steps.

Keep us in the loop.

Cheers!

[Kingfry7]

Why are you pretending like this is a technical issue when you know this was a conscious decision made by Spotify? Stop wasting our time with fake customer support

[Kingfry7]

…

[Kingfry7]

Elena, you are not being respectful of our time. This was a conscious decision made by Spotify on the last December update. You know this, why are you providing false customer support?

[Sälskinn]

I got the same issue, running IOS 14.8.1 on a Iphone XR and Spotify 8.6.84.1353

Tried multiple audio sources (itunes, nextory, podcaster) and they all pause if you open or switch to the spoty app.

I just tried for fun on one of my older devices, an iphone 6s thats not been patched for a century (IOS 12.4.8, spotify 8.6.50.969) and voilà - whatever audio is playing keeps running if I start the (really old) spotify app.

If you - I mean spotify ppl - want me to upgrade my old phone to the same IOS as my XR I expect a couple of free months worth of spotify for my inconvenience.

[Eni]

Hey @Sälskinn, 

Thanks for sending us this info. 

First up, it's well worth running a clean reinstall to get rid of any cached files that might be causing trouble. This one is more thorough than the usual one. 

If this doesn't do the trick, would you mind checking if the OS of you phone has any pending updates?

We'll be on the lookout for your reply.