Lock screen not working when using "Ok, Google"

[hlaraujo]

Plan

Premium

Country

Brazil

Device

Galaxy s21

Operating System

Android 11

My Question or Issue

So, I've been having this issue where sometimes the music controls widget on lock screen won't work. Can't play/pause, skip or go back, and when that happens, even the notification panel widget becomes unresponsive.

I've seen several other users with the same problem and different kind of solution that only work for some time before it happens again. For me, forcing closing spotify seems to work pretty well until this issue is triggered again.

On that note, I've noticed that every time I use voice command via Google assistant to play my music, this happens. Controls stop working and I have to force close the app for them to come back.

I don't know if there is any other way that this problem is triggered, but this with "OK, google" happens every time.

[Novy]

Hey there @hlaraujo, 

Thanks for reaching out about this. 

Would you mind letting us know if you've already tried performing a clean reinstall of the app? This is often an overlooked step, but it can be helpful to get rid of any corrupted files that might be causing issues. 

If this doesn't do the trick, could you try with a different device and let us know if the issue persists?

We'll keep an eye out for your reply. 

[hlaraujo]

Hey @Novy, thanks for getting back here.

Yeah, I did try a clean reinstall and it didn't work. I've tried to replicate this problem in an iphone using google assistant app and siri and none of them seem to trigger this problem.

However, on my friends galaxy s20, the same thing happens when he plays music via "ok google". Also, one thing we noticed is that when this happens, besides controls not working from the lock screen widget, it is not possible to fast-forward the song from the tracker in the notification panel with the phone unlocked.

[Novy]

Hey @hlaraujo, 

Thanks for this info. 

Just to confirm, is this still happening when you're playing music without the Google Assistant?

Could you give it a try using a different internet connection to see if you notice anything new?

Let us know how it goes.

[hlaraujo]

No, I haven't noticed this happening when I start playing music via de Spotify app. I used to think it would happen randomly after sometime playing, but I could only replicate this problem using "ok google" so far.

I tried using my wifi connection, my phone data, my friends phone as a hotspot and wifi from my work, and I'm getting the same results.

Just some additional info:
-When I use "ok google", the music controls that appear on the google assistant app still work fine with pausing and skipping/previous track.

-I thought it could be some problem with the lock screen widget, so I tried to disable it from my phone's settings and try to let spotify use its own lockscreen widget, but this didnt work.
-When this happens, as I said before, the tracker from the notification panel widget doesn't work, but the play/pause and skip/go back work normaly. But even then, if I lock my phone, the controls from the lock screen continue unresponsive.

[Novy]

Hi @hlaraujo, 

Thanks for getting back to us. 

Could you send over the exact Spotify version you're currently running?

We'd also recommend making sure that your device has enough storage space available (at least 1GB for optimum performance).

Keep us posted.

[hlaraujo]

Yeah, I have over 30gb of free storage left.

My app version is 8.6.8.1094.

[Novy]

Hi again @hlaraujo, 

Thanks for keeping us in the loop. 

Would you mind sending a video where we can take a better look at this issue and the controls that you mentioned that work in the Google Assistant app?

You can attach it to your next response to us by using the Insert Video option in the post editor or you can include a link to it, just make sure to exclude any personal info from it. 

We'll be on the lookout for your reply.

[hlaraujo]

Sure, there you go (had to make it super low res cause of the size limit):

[Novy]

Hey @hlaraujo, 

Thanks for this info! 

You mentioned that the music controls that appear in the Google Assistant app work fine, could you also send a video where we can see this?

It would be very helpful for us to continue investigating this issue. 

Keep us posted.

[hlaraujo]

Sure thing, here it is:

[Novy]

Hey @hlaraujo, 

We appreciate you taking the time to send all this info and to try everything we've suggested.

We've tried to reproduce this on our end, but were unable to and we haven't received other recent reports. Since a third party app is involved, this makes it very difficult to locate the cause of this specific issue. 

We'll be on the lookout for more reports and if we're able to gather some more data, we'll keep you posted. For now, we'd recommend just keeping both the Spotify and the Google Assistant apps updated to receive the latest fixes and optimizations. 

If anything else comes up, you know where to find us. 

Have a good one. 

[marcus42]

Hi ! I also have the same problem on my Samsung Galaxy S10e, the lock screen controls won't work when spotify is launched with google assistant. I have the latest version of Android, spotify and google installed on my phone and the problem has been there for several months now.

[Eni]

Hey there @marcus42, 

Thanks for getting in touch about this. 

Could you let us know which troubleshooting steps you've already tried?

Additionally, would you mind letting us know if this started happening after a specific event such as an update?

We'll be on the lookout.

[marcus42]

Hi @Eni , thanks for the quick answer. I tried to do a clean reinstall of the app, and using a different internet connection. I also tried it on my mom's phone, a fully updated Galaxy S10, which has the same problem. Both devices have over 50 Go of available space.

Unlike @hlaraujo , all the notification controls work perfectly, it's only the lockscreen controls that are completely unresponsive. The only way I found to make them work is to close the app, re-open it and manually start the music.

This does not occur when asking Google Assistant to play music from the Samsung Music app, or when asking Bixby (Samsung's assistant) to play something on Spotify.

I'm not sure, but the problem may have appeared after the update to Android 11/OneUI 3.0 in January 2021.

[Eni]

Hey there @marcus42, 

Thanks for your reply. 

Would you mind trying with a different Android phone brand to check if you can replicate the issue on it as well?

On another note, could you let us know what region/localization settings do you have?

Additionally, could you let us know if the same thing happens in case you switch to US/English settings?

We'll keep an eye out for your reply.

[marcus42]

Unfortunately I don't have access to another android phone from another brand.

I'm located in France and my phone's region is also France.

Just tried changing to English but it didn't help either.

[CarlosE]

Hey @marcus42,

Thanks for trying and keeping in touch.

We couldn't replicate this on our end and seems to be isolated to a very specific setup. We appreciate you taking the time to let us know about this, and rest assured, as soon as we gather more reports, we'll forward them to the right folks to be looked into.

Apologies for any inconvenience. If you have questions or need anything else, give us a shout.

Cheers!

[LesTrg]

I am also having this problem. 

I wrote a long post setting out the details, but it failed to post! I'll write one again a little later. 

Les

[LesTrg]

I have the same problem