Android App has become virtually unusable

[ArmourDyldo]

Plan

Premium

Country

Australia

Device

(ALL ANDROID DEVICES)

Operating System

(Android all versions)

My Question or Issue

This isn't particularly a question, more-so than bringing it to your attention as the app store reviews are hardly seeing any response from spotify.

Basically, since your last update (v8.7.28.1217) on all android devices running all versions of android, the app has become a buggy mess that makes it so frustrating to use that I am considering changing to iPhone just to combat it.
These are just faults I have personally experienced.
- "your library" comes up black and doesn't load anything (Needs to be closed & re-opened to fix)
- When connected to AndroidAuto or playing through another device (i.e; Google Nest, a SmartTV, PC etc etc.) if you queue a song, it will either queue it MANY more times than you requested, queue it for a few seconds then it disappears and the entire shuffled playlist re-shuffles, it won't queue it at all, or a combination of all 3.
- When my phone (Pixel 6) is locked, the status/play-bar sometimes shows up, but even if it does, it rarely works.

- Randomly pauses songs when playing through the device or AndroidAuto

- When tapping to press ANY features on the screen when playing a song (and having that song UI up with shuffle/replay buttons on the screen) it will make all buttons disappear showing that video that a song will play, then you need to tap it again to bring them back and then once more to actually press the button you requested to press

- When searching for songs it will just sit there loading indefinitely (not a network issue as an app restart will immediately fix this)
- When not in mobile/wifi range, trying to navigate to my podcasts section, it will take an absurd amount of time to bring up podcasts. Switching to "offline mode" does make it quicker, but it's still slow for absolutely no reason. This is even still slow when connected to the internet. This same fault applies to searching for your already downloaded music when not in reception.

All in all, the app and service USE to be OK, now its a steaming pile of garbage.
This is JUST my issues on android. Don't even get me started with features non-existent on PC and things you've neglected to implement from community suggestions over 5 years ago or features that straight up don't even work.

[Alex]

Hi there @ArmourDyldo,

Thanks for the post.

Sorry to hear that you're having such an experience with the app.

We'd recommend running a clean reinstall of the app. Please follow the steps from this Spotify Guide exactly, as this will assure that all app data is cleared completely, before reinstalling.

Also, make sure that Battery optimization is not enabled for Spotify from the system app settings, as well as that the app is granted all permissions. These settings could be hindering the performance of the app. Since there are so many issues with the app, there is most likely corrupted app data and cache, which should be fixed by the clean reinstall.

Note that these problems might also be arising from issues with your SD card, if you're using one. You can try removing the SD card before installing the app, and then check how things are working before inserting it again.

Keep us posted on how you get on with this.

Cheers.

[ArmourDyldo]

Hey, 

So I've tried a new install of the app with no luck. I don't have an SD card and th cache has been cleared a few times. It's literally only occured since the last update for myself and literally thousands of other android users. The problem is 100% on your end. 

[AndresM]

Hey @ArmourDyldo,

Thanks for your reply. 

Just to confirm, do you have a lot of content saved to your library (e.g. more than 2000 songs saved)? 

We'll be on the lookout for your next reply.  

[Tanguy_]

Plan

Premium

Country

France

Device

Samsung Galaxy S8

Operating System

Android 9

Hi,

Just to let the team know, I am also experiencing some of those issues on an Android phone (I can't relate to all of them as I don't use certain features, such as Android Auto, very often).

The main ones that are very irritating are the following:

 - The Homepage and "Your Library" page both take very long to load when the app is opened for the first time in a while (for example when I wake up in the morning) and is usually stuck to a black screen until the app is "forced closed" and re-opened.

 - Same thing for the "Liked Songs" page. It takes longer to load when connected to the internet than when offline (I have a somewhat big library ~3000 saved songs that are all downloaded on my SD card). This makes technical sense as the app wants to fetch all this info online, but in term of end-user convenience this is atrocious and extremely frustrating. The app should just default to showing downloaded songs, and then fetching the rest of the data online.

 - Buttons are not very responsive, especially clicking the Now Playing persistent bar to show the music player screen, as well as taping on a song in a playlist to play it or liking it with the heart.

 - The app sometimes randomly closes (I have a Galaxy S8 running on Android 9, so somewhat of an old phone but still very capable, and Spotify is used by millions of users daily, you can't just expect every single one of them to have the latest Galaxy S22 Ultra.....)

 - The Media Player notification is now persistent and can't be swiped away. I don't believe this to be a bug and must just be a flag switched on in the code, would be very easy to change back or at least give the users the option...

 - Just a preference thing: the "like song"/heart button next to every entry on the "Liked songs" page makes it very easy to un-like songs by accident and having to like them again, which then messes up the order of your library (putting songs you used to listen to a year ago between ones you are currently listening to)

In conclusion, all those performance issues are very frustrating and frankly unacceptable for a premium 10€/mo service...

I think that the development team should really focus on optimization instead of implementing new features for as long as it takes to make the app enjoyable again on low- and mid-range devices.

[Dian]

Hey there,

Thanks for the extensive description of the issues you're facing.

We'd like to make a few troubleshooting suggestions:

• Could you remove items from your library, because the number of items can slow down the performance of the mobile app? The fastest way to do this is through the app on a desktop PC. Perform a clean reinstall afterwards, if the next point is not valid for you.
• Is it possible to move the main app storage from the SD card (if there is an SD card used by Spotify) to the phone instead and see how the app behaves after a clean reinstall, like the one described here?
• How does the app with the same account on another phone behave?
• Does another account on the same phone create the same issues?
• It is also very important to make sure, that the Spotify app is set as an exception in your battery/memory optimization settings. The specific settings may vary between brands, but here is a list of the most common ones.

@Tanguy_ , thank you also for the feedback, we really appreciate it.

The media player notification on the locked screen display can be removed through the settings in the Android OS, but the success of this is fully dependent on the specific UI of the operating system. You can contact Samsung for more information on this topic.

We're constantly trying to improve the user experience in the app and we hope to see the "Like" button on a better position some day. You can find out on this page how your feedback reaches Spotify and submit an idea for the desired change.

Hope this helps,

Cheers!

[ArmourDyldo]

Hey mate,

I would have ~ 1,000 downloaded directly onto my phone (no SD card). Even still, all these issues have come since the update. I really think you guys have just made a bit of unstable code and it's messing with absolutely everything on Android devices. Mine has even started playing music during a phonecall randomly again. (only when connected to a Bluetooth device) this used to be an issue maybe 12months ago but was fixed by an update. 

[Eni]

Hey @ArmourDyldo, 

Thanks for getting back to us. 

We understand where you're coming from. Just to make sure, do you have a large library with over 2000 songs (not the downloaded, but the saved content)?

If so, keep in mind that having a large library with many playlists and songs can result in the app malfunctioning as it's constantly trying to sync with our servers in real time. 

On another note, could you let us know if the issue persists using a different phone?

Keep us posted.

[ArmourDyldo]

Hi,

For sure, like literally anyone using the service, I have more than 2,000 songs. But I think you guys are missing the key point here. It does it offline just as bad. And I forgot to report podcasts are EXPONENTIALLY worse! Can take literally 10 seconds to load a podcast folder. Doesn't matter if you're online or offline. Podcasts have been an issue for a long time, but its gotten worse since this last destroying update. 

If the issue lies within a regular synchronisation, how about adding an option for users to choose a synch time? I'd be happy with my phone synching once a day instead of every single time I open my library, if it meant I could play music within a reasonable timeframe. 

[Eni]

Hey @ArmourDyldo, 

Thanks for your reply. 

Would you mind logging in to your account on a different phone to see if you're having the same issues there? This would help us know if the issue is device-related. 

We appreciate your feedback regarding the app syncing and we'll make sure to pass it on to the right folks. 

We'll be on the lookout.

[Massengine]

Hi all, quick input over here 🙂

I was having plenty of the above mentioned problems myself, and decided to try giving the app permision to everything, even stuff that doesnt make sense (microphone, contacts, etc.)

I opened spotify afterwards and the playbar was back, and it hasn't randomly paused yet. I'll get back if these issues reappear, but it could be the short-term solution you're all looking for.

Hope this helps someone!

[OscarDC]

Hey @Massengine,

Thank you for reaching out to the Community and welcome. 

We're glad that everything is working well at the moment. We appreciate the time you took following the troubleshooting, testing this by yourself and sharing what works for you. Hopefully, other users will find this useful to fix their own issues.

In case anything else comes up, you know where to find us 🙂

Cheers!

[broken_ipod]

I have a a51 5g updated to android 12 and I have had the same problems. Spotify used to be great. Ive had premium for years. Ive been more loyal to spotify than i have to ex girlfriends. And now I feel like a loser for paying for it. Black screen, won't search for songs, randomly pauses and just stops playing tracks and podcasts. Literally horrible I might as well be using YouTube. Can u believe that, spotify? You're reminiscent of YouTube now. I work at a job where I have to wear gloves and evrytime your app stops I have to take off gloves, go thru all the motions of usually pressing play again sometimes having to find the podcast or track again. It's a huge waste of time. OH AND HERES ONE THING THAT REALLY SUCKS: it almost always plays shuffle when I just play my liked songs list and there's no way to change it from the list itself. I have tried SD card and stuck with NO SD card. I've reinstalled gave it all permissions and made sure it was unrestricted. This is the most disappointing, horrible thing to happen since covid and I'm about to switch my entire phone service just to try to help yall get yourselves  together which is sad. It doesn't seem like you want to help or change anything judging by your moderator responses either 

[1127389731]

Tried pretty much everything to make andriod app useable, cancelled subs today. might return if it gets sorted VLC FTW

[Brody6145]

Plan: Premium for 5+ years

Country: USA

Devices and operating systems: All Android devices and all Android operating systems

Errors:

Forgive me for being blunt in this but I have now typed this three times because it was not allowing me to post this before for some reason  but Me and some friends have many of these same issues even to this day we have done everything in our power that we can possibly see to fix this issue including but not limited to (force closing and stopping the app, clearing the cache, clearing the storage, deleting and reinstalling the app, completely factory resetting our devices, making sure that any form of data or battery saver is off) we've even gone so far as to turn off all of the extra features in Spotify to try to make these problems better again including but not limited to (never using CarPlay, never using automix, never using gapless or crossfade, never using canvases, never using autoplay) All of these errors seem to be consistent across all of our Android devices no matter update of the operating system or the actual device itself. Some of us have left Spotify completely because the errors don't seem to be being looked at or addressed and there is no option to roll back some of these updates to get to the point when Spotify was actually good. All of us have had Spotify for several years I myself have had it for over 5 years and even upgraded to the Spotify Hulu bundle which is no longer available and is one of the few things that is still keeping me tied to Spotify. 

Please do better Spotify or at least give an option to roll back to the previous update until all of these atrocious bugs are fixed then maybe I'll give it a try because I used to love Spotify but this is becoming so cumbersome,

Thank you

[vaajy]

It is. It's a total mess now. Now playing view.

It has item after item after item to scroll. First cover, then song data, then lyrics, tickets, then artist videos, it's a mess. Not minimal.

I remember the time when it was easy and simple to use! Not now. Please DECLUTTER!!!

It's long time scrolling and most of the information is not wanted in Now Playing views.

Next time perhaps add stolovkas where artist ate last time. So we can scroll more.

[greasygaijin]

Same issue here. I'm gonna give it another month or so and once these issues aren't fixed I'm cancelling my sub. I don't pay $10+ a month to sit and wait for 5 minutes every time I head out and want music playing along. Utterly ridiculous that this "Service" I pay for is so utterly unsalvageable. Maybe one more RhCP track will cheer me up?? As if I didn't skip em' the last umpteen times they came on automatically thru recommended. Again, the service I pay for.

[greasygaijin]

Actually forget it. It's been a half hour since I put a jacket on to walk out and I'm still waiting on your**bleep** app to load one individual track because it ALWAYS picks SHITE on a first shuffle. I'm cancelling as soon as my library is backed up. 🙂