Can't connect to Google Nest Mini

[gawyndragonspawn]

I'm unable to connect Spotify to my Google Nest Mini from any device logged into my account. I can connect to my wife's Nest Mini, and she can connect to my Nest Mini (as well as her own).
I have:
1. Rebooted the Nest Mini
2. Unlinked/relinked my Spotify account in Google Home
3. Factory reset the Nest Mini, readded it to Google Home, and relinked the account
4. Rebooted my phone (Android/Samsung Galaxy S9), desktop (Windows 11), and laptop (Windows 11)
5. Clean re-installed Spotify on all my devices
6. Cleared caches on all devices
7. Tried connecting from the Spotify web player
8. Tried different networks
9. Reset the modem
10. Cleared DNS caches on the network

[OscarDC]

Hey @gawyndragonspawn,

Thank you for reaching out to the Community and welcome. 

We appreciate all the troubleshooting you've included in your post, it's really helpful. In order to continue investigating this issue, it would be great if you could log in to your account but using your wife's device to see if you can connect from it. 

Also, would you mind connecting your phone with your Google nest mini using the Home app prior to using it with Spotify to see if it makes any difference?

Lastly, since some routers may have 2 different ranges (2,4 GHz and 5.0 GHz), we'd also recommend making sure both devices are on the same exact network to see if the issue persists.

We'll be on the lookout. 

[gawyndragonspawn]

Hi,

So I want to mention that I've been a programmer for over 25 years and a technician for over 30. I'm currently working not only as a programmer in multiple languages, but also as a network administrator. Troubleshooting is something I do on a daily basis.

I've already signed in on multiple devices without any difference. I've connected my phone to the Nest Mini both before attempting to connect to it with Spotify as well as connect to it directly through the Spotify app. If I use the "cast to this device" button in the Google Home app, I can cast any app's audio except the Spotify audio. 

My router is indeed dual band, and the first thing I did was ensure that all devices were connected to the same band. In the case of the desktop machine, it's connected directly via ethernet cable.

I also run an internal DNS and DHCP server, both of which I tried disabling without any difference, and I've checked firewall settings on all devices, the router, and my internal network's server - up to and including disabling firewalls (temporarily) on any device I'm able to.

Based on the fact that I can connect to my wife's Nest Mini, and she can connect to both hers and my Nest Mini without issue, and the fact that I can't connect from four different devices (including the web player), I'm convinced that this is somehow an account issue that's specific to my connection to my Google Nest Mini.

[Joan]

Hi @gawyndragonspawn,

Thank you for the reply. To make sure we understand correctly, could you please confirm the following. If you haven't tested any of these things, please do so:

1. Can you connect normally with your wife's account from any device, including the ones where it doesn't work with your account?
2. What different networks have you tried? If you haven't tried with a mobile hotspot from various devices, try doing that as well.
3. What is the exact behaviour when you try to connect? If you get an error, what does it say? Some screenshots or a video would be very helpful. If the files are too large to attach here in the Community, you can send them to us via Google Drive or as unlisted YouTube videos.
4. Is it correct that other audio sources work with the affected Nest device, but only Spotify cannot cast audio to it?

These will help us narrow down the root cause and find a solution.

Let us know how it goes.

[gawyndragonspawn]

Hi,

1. I'll need to wait to test her account from my phone/laptop/desktop as she's currently away.

2. I've tried my normal network (dual-band wireless router, Nest Mini connected to 5GHz, laptop and phone connected to 5GHz, and desktop plugged in directly via ethernet cable), a spare single-band (2.4GHz) wireless router I have on hand (Nest Mini, phone, and laptop connected to the 2.4GHz band, and desktop plugged directly via ethernet), and mobile hotspots from two different phones (Samsung Galaxy S9, and Samsung Galaxy A5). In the case of both routers I tried both with and without my internal server active (DHCP, DNS, and Firewall). In the case of the mobile hotspot, the server wasn't connected and thus the phone acted as the DHCP/DNS authoritative.

3. The exact behavior (screenshots attached with some device names blurred for security) is as follows:

    a. I click/touch the "Connect to a device" icon.

    b. From the list that appears, (screenshot 1) I select my "Office speaker".

    c. The status bar message appears saying "Connecting to Office speaker", and the "Connect to device" icon fades in and out. The length of time the message shows and fading occurs for varies depending on the attempt, but generally anywhere from 1 to 90 seconds - although I haven't actually timed it, so those estimates may not be exact. No error messages show up in Spotify on any device, and there are no Spotify logs at all in the Windows 11 Event Viewer.

    d. There is no connection sound or response from the Nest Mini. Spotify just stops showing the status bar message, and stops fading the "Connect to a device" icon.

4. I can successfully cast audio from YouTube, Disney+, or if I connect directly to the speaker through the Google Home app, it will play audio from nearly any app that I have open, as long as I have my phone's sound turned up. In the case of the Windows 11 devices, when in Chrome I can successfully cast the audio from YouTube without issue (I haven't tried casting from any other location besides Chrome, as that verified the connection worked).

I should also note that two weeks ago everything worked without issue. I could connect from any of my devices and stream any of my Spotify playlists, which is often what I did while working, or to give my pet some background noise when I couldn't physically be in my home office.

[gawyndragonspawn · Accepted solution]

Update:

My wife sent me her credentials to log into her Spotify account, which I did from my desktop machine. I was immediately able to connect to the "Office speaker" Google Nest Mini without any issue.

The strange thing, however, is that when I logged off of her account and back into mine, I was suddenly able to connect to my Nest Mini again; not just from the desktop machine - which is the only place I logged in with her account - but from my phone and laptop as well. I'm not sure why logging into her account on a single device would cause a change that allowed all my devices to connect again, but there you have it. This can now be marked as resolved, although if you have any ideas as to why this happened and why logging into her account on only one device allowed all my devices to connect again, I would love to hear them.

[Isaacl122]

Plan

Premium

Country

Canada

Device

iPhone 13, Asus Vivobook S14 AMD

Operating System

iOS 18, Windows 11

My Question or Issue

Hello!

Since a few months ago, I have had troubles connecting my Spotify account to my Google Home Mini speaker in my room. Here's what I've tried:

- Uninstalling/reinstalling both Google Home & Spotify Apps

- Factory resetting my Google Home Mini

- Reconnecting my Google Home Mini to my Wifi

- Unplugging and plugging the Google Home Mini

The strange thing is, my sister's Google Home Mini appears as an option to connect to (same Wifi network) but mine is inexplicably missing. Also, I can tell my Google to play Spotify and it'll manage to connect to my Spotify account and be controllable afterwards; it just doesn't let me connect to it from the start using the app.