audio break up when moving between mobile / wifi / downloaded

[abe_crab]

Plan

Premium

Country

UK

Device

iPhone 12 mini and iPhone 13 Mini

Operating System

iOS 17, 18, 24

My Question or Issue

I often leave the flat listening to a podcast.  I find that the audio chops and breaks up when I lose contact with wifi and enter mobile.  It's unlistenable and I have to turn off.  I have to walk for a minute or so more before it works smoothly.  It happens for music or podcast.  Downloading seems to make no difference, and the mobile signal on my street is strong.  If I download, turn off both mobile and wifi, then leave the house, all is well, confirming it's to do with moving between networking modes and/or audio source (downloading seems irrelevant).  This happened on my old iphone 12 on iOS 18 at least and i think before and happens on my recently acquired iphone 13 mini iOS 26 (I notice 26.1 has just arrived and I'll install).  This is really annoying.  I have to turn off, leave the house, walk for 3 to 5 minutes, and only then can I start listening.

[MihailY]

Hey @abe_crab,

Thanks for reaching out!

Does this happen when switching from this particular WiFi to mobile data or from any other wireless network? Also, what is your streaming quality set to? Can you test how it behaves with different settings? This will help us narrow down the possible root cause.

Let us know how it goes.

[abe_crab]

"Automatic", which I suppose is the default, for both wifi and cellular.  I'd always be using my 5G wifi.  I could try the 2G one instead so that it's at least a distinct wifi, but I don't have others I could try.  I suppose I could try at a friend's house but i've nothing lined up.

The audio chops and stutters most annoyingly long after I'm out of range of wifi and spotify should have switched to either mobile or downloaded.  It doesn't seem to matter whether or not I've downloaded the podcast, it's 3 or 4 minutes and a quarter of a mile before it stabilises.  It also happens for music (hardly suprisingly).

I thought I'd reproduced it indoors by turning wifi and mobile off, but not managing to do so just now.

It's happened on my old iphone i12 mini and my  current i13 mini.  ios 17 and 18 on the old, and 26 on the new.

[MihailY]

Hey @abe_crab,

Thanks for your reply and the additional info.

Since you mention that this also happened with your old phone, it's unlikely that it's device-specific, but it's still a good idea to try running a clean reinstall of the app as described here. 

Also, check if Background app refresh is enabled for Spotify in your phone's settings and see if the audio breaks up when your phone is unlocked with the app in focus.

If the issue occurs when connected to a Bluetooth device, try playing from the phone speaker.

Keep us posted.

[abe_crab]

Background app Refresh is ok.

I tried switching between speaker and bluetooth headphones and amazingly that made a difference!  I never would have thought it, because surely the bluetooth link is completely separate from mobile/wifi/downloaded music stream!  I tried the same with Apple Music - again, the same!  So it must be somehow a bug in iOS, would you think?

Not Spotify's problem but you do know about iPhone API and environment - any ideas?

I tried turning the bluetooth headset off and on, and that seemed to resolve it, but that took a little time and this problem does resolve with time.  Nevertheless I think that does resolve it and I'll try that on my next ordinary departure from home, listening to a podcast.

Thanks for your help, any further opinions welcome!

[MihailY · Accepted solution]

Hey @abe_crab,

Glad to hear that you were able to make progress with this issue!

I did some research on the topic and it turns out that Bluetooth and WiFi actually have something in common - they share the same 2.4 GHz frequency band which could potentially cause interference.

My best guess is that if your router supports both the 5 GHz and 2.4 GHz bands, your phone most probably tries to switch from the higher speed/shorter range network (5 GHz) to the longer range one (2.4 GHz) when leaving the house which either causes interference with the Bluetooth signal or is simply prioritized as a system process over the Bluetooth connection. You can test if this is the case by forgetting the 2.4 GHz network in your WiFi settings so that the phone switches immediately to mobile data.

If turning the headset off and on helps for now, I guess you can try re-pairing it should the issue appear again.

In any case, let me know how you get on. As a lifelong Android user, my iOS knowledge is limited, but my Google-fu is strong, so I'll do my best to help you out!

[abe_crab]

That worked just now.  I did think I'd tested another time by turning wifi off just before leaving (with a downloaded podcast).  I'll repeat the test, and also try adding the 2.4G back, but turn off wifi before leaving (which I thought I had, but I'll try again).  I'll update, but this slightly sounds like an Apple problem.  One silly thing is I neglected to check if I had "auto-join", because I don't think I did (I run on 5G and when in the remotest room or the garden I deliberately switch).

PS the Captcha on this page is really onerous and failed

[abe_crab]

Some more: I think iPhone does not switch from chosen 2.4GHz to auto-join 5Ghz, so that I've been leaving the house fairly often with it on 2.4GHz.  Today I specifically changed to my 5GHz Wifi AP and left the flat - all OK!  Therefore I think this is the problem.  I notice there are iOS cases mentioning 2.4GHz and bluetooth what's more!

I had Android until a couple of years ago, and I never had the problem.  Looking on my android tablet, with an autojoin 5GHz and a non-auto join 2.4GHz, it doesn't automatically leave 2.4GHz for the autojoin 5GHz.  I suppose that's not surprising.   Anyway I never had the problem on Android, so perhaps somehow Android is a little more graceful about handling a 2.4GHz wifi connection concurrently with a bluetooth headphone connection.  That's all by the way, I have my workround for iPhone now!!