Bluetooth headphones open Spotify when pressing play button.

[etgfu8ujrtln1]

Device

Huawei P20 lite

Operating System

Android 9

My Question or Issue

When Bluetooth headphones are connected, pressing the play/pause button will automatically launch and play Spotify even when it's not already open. This is particularly annoying as sometimes when using another app one press will pause that app but a second press will open Spotify instead of playing the app I was previously listening to. How on earth do I disable this? 

[etgfu8ujrtln1]

Hi @chrisos86,

Thank you for posting on this thread!

After running some tests from our side using different phones, devices and OS we can conclude that the way the app behaves when connected to Bluetooth devices, including car stereo systems, varies based on the device involved. These actions are a result of how the specific Bluetooth device is designed to interact with the Spotify API. However, we’re constantly optimizing our app, so this behavior might change in future updates.

We understand where you're coming from, so in this case we can suggest you submit a new Idea to implement an option to manually enable/disable automatic Bluetooth playback from the app, as it might help with this issue. In this article you can find the steps to submit it.

Let us know if you have any questions.

[Ponker]

I have the exact same problem, also using Huawei P20.
When listening to Acast (podcast app), and hit Play/pause button on my bluetooth headset it paus the application. And if paused for more than 5-10 minutes it launches spotify when I press the play/pause button on my headset instead of keep playing Acast.. (spotify app is not open).

Someone with a fix to this?

[Elena]

Hey there @etgfu8ujrtln1 and @Ponker,

Thank you for your posts and for letting us know about this. We're happy to help.

It's possible that this is happening because Spotify is set as your default music player. To change that you can go on your home screen touch Settings, enter Apps > Advanced > Default app settings > Music, and then select a third-party music player as the default music player.

If that's not the case we suggest that you perform a clean reinstall of the app.

If the issue still persists after this - let us know your Spotify version.

We'll have an eye out for your replies 🙂

Cheers!

[jvalteren]

Hi Elena,

I'm running Android 11 on a Samsung Galaxy S10. Unfortunately, this issue still persists, since there is no Music default app setting that I can change. I only see defaults for Browser, Phone, SMS etc. not Music.

Any ideas?

Kind regards,

Jonathan

[Ver]

Hey @jvalteren,

Thanks for posting here in the Community 🙂

Could you share with us the following info? We'll look into this further.

• Did this happen after an update?
• The model of the headphones.
• The troubleshooting steps you've tried so far. That way we'll be able to avoid any repeating steps.

Keep us in the loop! We'll be right here if you have any questions.

[somedanishguy]

I have the same problem on a Galaxy S6. No defaults are set for Spotify and there is no default app for music. It wasn't always like this - I used to be able to play and pause other sound apps with my phone untouched in my pocket. But that was months, perhaps more than a year ago. It is super annoying on a daily basis.

[CarlosE]

Hi there @somedanishguy,

Thanks for reaching out and welcome to the Community.

Can you confirm if you followed these steps to clean reinstall the app? If those didn't do the trick, try logging out > unpairing your headphones from your phone > restarting your phone and pairing them again > logging back in to your Spotify account. Any difference?

If the issue persists and if possible, could you try with other headphones to see if this behavior is the same? Also, try with your original headphones on another mobile device to see how it goes. This would help us narrow down if this is related to the phone or to the headphones.

Keep us posted.

[somedanishguy]

Hi CarlosE

Thanks for your reply.
I can confirm that I have now done a clean reinstall of the app.
The app is still starting when I just want to stop playing audio in another app by using headphones. The issue is there with wired headphones as well as Bluetooth headphones, so there's no pairing reset to fix the problem when using wired headphones. If the problem is one of the headphones, I think it would be both of them.
I only have one mobile device, so I can't test on another device - sorry.

Is it true that the Android on Samsung Galaxy S6 just doesn't have settings for default music app (for remote-controlled play/pause)? I would like to try to just set no default music app, and see if the Spotify app would then "mind its own business" when I'm listening on another app. I don't want to uninstall Spotify to avoid the problem.

I tried using another music app than the one that got "high-jacked" by Spotify, and this other app (the Danish app YouSee Musik) was not high-jacked. Play and pause worked, and Spotify didn't start. The app that got high-jacked was the major Danish app DR LYD. Could it be that something in DR LYD causes Spotify to start on the stop-signal? Could there perhaps just be an error that YouSee Musik is immune to, but DR LYD is not? YouSee Musik shares a function with Spotify: When one of the apps has just been playing music, and was closed, the start-signal makes that same app play again. DR LYD does not have this function. So I assume YouSee Musik and DR LYD do not run in the system in the same way, and that perhaps DR LYD wouldn't experience the problem if it worked like YouSee Musik. If there's something you can see that the DR developers could do to fix DR LYD, I can send the advice on, as I've also reported the issue to them.

Thank you 🙂

[Eni]

Hi @somedanishguy,

Thanks for getting back to us. 

Would you mind heading over to Settings >  Apps > Manage apps > Spotify and deactivating the Autostart option? Let us know if that makes any difference.

If you don't see this option, could you send us a screenshot of what options are you seeing when you tap on Spotify?

We'll be on the lookout for your reply.

[somedanishguy]

Hi Eni

Thanks for your reply.

I am not seeing an Autostart option - see the attached screenshot clip. There is also no Autostart option within 'Notifications', 'Permissions' or 'Set as default'.

[Jeremy]

Hi there @somedanishguy,

Thank you for your reply.

Can you send us a screen recording of what you see when you follow the steps that's provided above?

We'll keep an eye out for your reply 🙂 

Take care!

[Anziety]

P30 Pro. Same issue. Extremely annoying. This has nothing to do with app settings. Suspect Google maps as the culprit because you can set the default for music in Google's driving mode, the assistant default music provider.

[MafeG]

Hi @Anziety,

Thank you for posting on this thread. 

We'd like to confirm if you only have this issue when your Google Maps is active, or if it's something else. Please give us as many details as possible about the behavior you're presenting in order to better understand the issue.

Some screenshots or a video might come in handy as well.

We'll be on the lookout. 

[chrisos86]

I have the same problem with Spotify on my Huawei P30 pro. When I press the play button on my headphones, it automatically launches Spotify (even if I force-close Spotify before that). This is extremely annoying especially when using the same Bluetooth headphones across multiple devices, beause sometimes the play button helps the headphones to connect and then I always have to manually stop Spotify from playing on my phone.

[MafeG]

Hi @chrisos86,

Thank you for posting on this thread!

After running some tests from our side using different phones, devices and OS we can conclude that the way the app behaves when connected to Bluetooth devices, including car stereo systems, varies based on the device involved. These actions are a result of how the specific Bluetooth device is designed to interact with the Spotify API. However, we’re constantly optimizing our app, so this behavior might change in future updates.

We understand where you're coming from, so in this case we can suggest you submit a new Idea to implement an option to manually enable/disable automatic Bluetooth playback from the app, as it might help with this issue. In this article you can find the steps to submit it.

Let us know if you have any questions.

[somedanishguy]

My problem now seems to be fixed. I can play and pause other sound apps, without Spotify interfering. Yay! I found out at random, after several months of frustration with the Spotify app.

[Spotuser10]

Hi 

Would you please tell us how you solved it?

Many thanks 

[Spotuser10]

Hi

Would you please tell us how you solved it?

Many thanks

[Anziety]

Solution was to unsub from Spotify and uninstall that terrible app.

[maliusmaximus]

Is there an update on this? Spotify randomly automatically starts and plays music if I have my earbuds connected. No way to turn it off in spotify, android, or earbud settings based on what I've read so far. Samsung Galaxy a32 and Buds 2 pro