Spotify pausing when phone locked or unlocked

[Tankcomdestroyer]

Plan

Premium

Country

United Kingdom

Device

Google Pixel 6

Operating System

Android 12

My Question or Issue

Whenever Spotify is playing through either the speakers or through Bluetooth headphones, either: The device is locked and screen turned off and 5-15 seconds later the audio will cut out, or when I unlock the device the audio will cut out instantaneously.

This either requires me to manually pause and un-pause or it just continues playing a second or two later.

I have done multiple fresh installs. Issue persists, please advise.

[Jeremy]

Hi there @Tankcomdestroyer,

Thank you for reaching out to the Community.

Can you confirm that you followed the steps that's provided in this article? There's some more steps to help thoroughly uninstall the app from your phone so if you haven't, we'd highly suggest it since the steps will make sure there's no old cache files causing this.

If that doesn't do the trick, we recommend that you try disabling any battery optimization software running on your phone.

Let us know how it goes 🙂

Take care!

[Tankcomdestroyer]

Hi Jeremy,

Yes I followed the steps from that article. There was battery optimisation software running (its native in Android 12). When I disabled it, the issue didn't happen for a few hours, but then came back to the same frequency as before so I re-enabled it. 

[MafeG]

Hi @Tankcomdestroyer,

Thank you for your reply and sharing those insights. 

If the app worked properly for a couple of hours, then we suggest you try to add Spotify to the exceptions of the battery optimization app. This way you don't have to disable it entirely. 

Also, please go to your phone's settings and make sure Spotify has enabled all app permissions. 

Lastly, look for a setting called Background App Refresh and make sure Spotify is toggled on. 

Let us know how this goes. 

[Tankcomdestroyer]

Spotify is on the list of exceptions, and has all permissions enabled.

The issue has persisted throughout and seems to happen more often than before. 

[CarlosE]

Hey @Tankcomdestroyer,

Thanks for keeping in touch.

To confirm, did you make sure to toggle on Background App Refresh for Spotify?

If this doesn't make a difference, could you let us know when this started happening and if it as after a specific event, such as an app or OS update?

Keep us posted.

[Tankcomdestroyer]

Background app refresh doesn't exist as an option.

This has occurred since release day of the phone - pixel 6, android 12

[Eni]

Hey @Tankcomdestroyer. 

Thanks for getting back to us. 

Just to make sure, is this only happening when you're listening to music on an external device via Bluetooth or when you're streaming directly on your phone as well?

On another note, could ask a friend or a family member to log in to their account in your phone and check if the issue persists with a different account?

We'll be on the lookout for your reply.

[Tankcomdestroyer]

Issue occurs through bluetooth and through device speakers.

issue also persists when alternative accounts used.

[Eni]

Hi there @Tankcomdestroyer,

Thanks for letting us know that. 

No worries, we can add a few more steps to make sure we've covered all bases. Could you try following these specific steps?:

• Head over to Settings on your phone > tap on Battery.
• Tap the 3 dots menu > Battery Usage.
• Under Battery usage since full charge you will see a list of apps > tap More (...).
• Select Show full device usage > Tap the Spotify app.
• If the Background restriction is on, disable it.

If those steps don't make any difference, could you let us know if the issue only happens with Spotify or with other streaming apps as well?

We'll keep an eye out for your reply.

[Tankcomdestroyer]

There was no background restriction.

It happened once with Deezer then stopped, but doesn't happen with any other services like YouTube music, as far as I am aware.

[Ver]

Hey @Tankcomdestroyer,

Thanks for getting back to us.

In this case it seems like this could be isolated to the particular setup and more specifically how Bluetooth devices react with the Spotify app over your phone.

We are constantly making improvements, however we can't set an exact timeframe for a fix.

We'd suggest that you keep your app up-to-date so don't miss the latest fixes.

The Community is here for you if there's anything else!
 

[Tankcomdestroyer]

It never did this when I was on my old phone with the same Bluetooth headphones. (Honor 10, Android 10), so its probably an android 12 + Spotify interaction issue.

[dunny3459]

Same issues here with my Pixel 6 on Android 12 but no issues on my Pixel 2XL on Android 11. Don't even have to be connected to any Bluetooth devices and still have the audio stop and start constantly. 

[danhandsomemansome]

Same for me. Spotify began doing this on my Pixel 4a5g and would randomly pause if the screen turned off. When I switched to my 6 pro Spotify actually worked correctly and until maybe 5 days ago it worked flawlessly. Then one day it just didn't. I never changed any settings for it or five anything differently. It just started to pause when my screen was off randomly and then started doing it more and more.

You should ask customers to submit debug logs after these events happened with the time, date, make and model, Android OS, security update date, stock or custom rom and then if you are on cellular data or wifi, if vpn is on/off, what apps where they recently using if any, if screen was off or on, and submit it to your engineering department. 

That way you can find some commonality in the cases and hunt down the bug. Could be how bloated the app gets in data (in the Gbs) and or it's handling of long playlists that are saved or not saved to the device. 

[dretchswatter]

This happens to me as well, same phone, but doesn't matter if the screen is on. I'll be sending messages and it will pause randomly. No other audio starts playing, and I can use the notification drop-down to get it going again. 

[Pam12]

Going to Settings -> App Info -> Spotify -> Battery Usage -> Changing from "optimised" mode to "unrestricted" mode fixed this issue in my device. 

Device info: Android 12 | Samsung A52

[StephanWe]

This is bugging me like crazy. I have a Pixel 5a, Android 12 (May 5, 2022), Spotify Version 8.7.38.668.

If I leave the display on while Spotify is running and the screen is shutting off after the given period, Spotify stops, actually is stopped completely. I have to restart it.

If I let it run and then shut off the display manually by pressing the on/off, Spotify continues to play.

[Yordan]

Hi @StephanWe!

In addition to disabling all background restrictions for Spotify (done from the phone's settings > Apps > Spotify), make sure to disable the battery optimization as well, since it could be hindering the app's performance, then try letting your phone shut off the screen by itself to see if the app would still stop.

Something else you can test is setting the time for the display to shut off to a lower amount. If you had it at more than 10 minutes, and the background restriction / battery optimization were turned on, it's possible that they were causing the app to stop. The time it takes for the app background management to kick in varies between manufacturers, so you might have set the screen to shut off precisely when the device begins managing background processes.

Let us know how it goes. Cheers!

[StephanWe]

Tried it all.

The solution was that I have "Greenify" installed and had to exempt Spotify there. Ha ha 😅