"Spotify can't play this right now. If you have the file on your computer you can import it."

[Nazgren]

I'm getting this error on my PC but none of the 3 suggested fixes which are restarting the PC, perform an entirely clean reinstall or updating sound drivers has fixed it. Anyone got any ideas?

[Bittencourt]

Hi @Nazgren, thanks for writing!

Please check your PC's soundcard and/or your headphone output (if you're using one) and let me know if they might be related to this issue.

Did it start happening after a specific event?

[Nazgren]

I don't have a soundcard and my headphones are fine. Spotify is the only thing having an issue. This problem has been ongoing for some time so I can't specify any event that may have caused this but I believe it started happening randomnly.

[Elena]

Hey there @Nazgren!

Thanks for keeping us posted.

We can suggest that you try downloading the app form the Microsoft store and making sure that the app is set as an exception in your Firewall settings.

It's also worth trying to disable hardware acceleration in the app:

1. Click Edit in the menu bar. Select Preferences.

2. Scroll down to Compatibility and uncheck Enable Hardware acceleration.

3. Restart Spotify.

If the issue persists, it'd be good if you could let us know if this persists using a different network (for example start a hotspot on your phone) and if you're able to play music on the web player. Also, does this happen to all your songs?

Keep us in the loop.

[lyravega]

I'm also getting this message. 

My phone app works fine. Web player on my PC works fine. However, the Windows app gives me this message. A day or two ago, all was working fine. 

I've tried pretty much anything I can think of & find online. From disabling hardware acceleration to removing local stuff, even reinstalling the app. None of them worked.

As I've said, it was working fine a day or two ago. I don't know if any update for Windows or Spotify messed it up, but manually I changed nothing that might result in this issue.

[MrDanDan]

Do you have Voicemeter Banana/Potato on your computer? If so, uninstall it. Uninstall Spotify. Restart your computer and re-install Spotify

[Elena]

Hey folks,

Thanks for keeping us in the loop.

As @MrDanDan mentions it's possible that some apps might interfere with Spotify's sound, so it's a good to check that.

We'd also recommend making sure your Windows' driver are all up to date and editing the Windows' hosts-file by following these steps:

1. Open Notepad as an administrator (right-click on the executable > Run as administrator)
2. Go to File > Open and navigate to C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc
3. Choose "All Files" instead of "Text Documents" next to the File Name box. You'll see a handful of files. Pick hosts and click on Open
4. When the file is open, you will see a block of text with # in front of each line and might see entries like 0.0.0.0 website.com 127.0.0.1 website2.com
5. Check for any entries with Spotify in the address. Examples may look like: 0.0.0.0 weblb-wg.gslb.spotify.com0.0.0.0
6. Remove such lines that contain Spotify if you do find any them.
7. Save your changes and restart the Spotify app.

Let us know how it goes.

[lyravega]

The mentioned apps aren't installed. As far as hosts file goes, it's a vanilla hosts file; no entries in it. I did another reinstall, same issue. No idea at this point. I can listen to Spotify through the Web, but compared to the Windows App, it feels gutted =/

[Eni]

Hey there @lyravega, 

Thanks for getting back to us. 

No worries, we can try a few more things to make sure we've covered all bases. 

We suggest that you head over to Settings > toggle on Show Local Files > toggle off all the sources that appear there > toggle off Show Local Files. Afterwards, make sure to log out > restart your PC > log back in. 

Keep us posted on how it goes.

[lyravega]

Same issue unfortunately. Followed the exact steps, on top of that reinstalled Spotify again. No luck. 

[lyravega · Accepted solution]

Ok, an update. I found the culprit... in short, it's "App Volume and Device Preferences"; resetting Spotify's output device from there solved it. 

I have multiple output devices, and Spotify was set to use a non-default one. When I'm gaming, I tend to set default output to my headset, and when I'm not gaming, I set the default to my home theatre. 

Windows recently (as in, I recently discovered it) added a function that allows users to set default output devices per application. Example is attached. So I set Spotify to always use a single device, no matter what the default output is. I'm not sure why, but Spotify decided to no longer work with a non-default audio output source after working fine for a long while.

When I flipped Spotify's output to default, it started working normally. Then I flipped it back to a non-default output to see if Spotify would give me the same error again, however it didn't. This is the part that puzzles me right now; even though I managed to identify the culprit, it didn't trigger on its own; trigger is still unknown (poetic!).

I have a suspicion on that as well though, I think if anything causes Windows to change the default output device for any reason, it might have an unintended effect for Spotify if Spotify is set to use a non-default output through Windows' per-app based sound input/output menu. But it's just a suspicion about the trigger. Culprit is definitely setting a non-default device as the output device for Spotify, in my case. 

I have no idea what went haywire, but I managed to solve it. Whew... I was getting sick of web player! Thanks for all the help.

[Bittencourt]

Hey @lyravega, I'm glad you could manage to solve the issue 🙂

@Nazgren and @MrDanDan what about you guys?

[Nazgren]

Apologies, I was on an extended Christmas holiday. This fixed it for me too. For me, Spotify didn't even have an output device selected in that menu, so it wasn't able to output at all but its fixed now. Many thanks, @lyravega for finding the solution and to all others who chipped in.

[lyravega]

You are welcome!

[gwoehlk]

dude, you're a legend, thank you. This was frustrating me so much.

[mikii123]

I have a similar issue, here are the repro steps:

1. 2 audio output devices: A and B.
2. Set the default to A in Windows.
3. Start Spotify.
4. Play - Get error "Spotify can't play this right now".
5. Switch default to B.
6. Play - works fine.
7. Switch back to A - plays fine...

Seems that when I start spotify with the default output set to A - it won't play until I switch outputs back and forth.

Starting Spotify with the default set to B skips all these steps and just works fine.

All windows per-app settings are set to default values. No other application has this or similar issue. For context: A is USB, B is jack.

Tried every solution proposed in this thread - nothing.

[Joan]

Hi there @mikii123,

Thanks for reaching out. Do you happen to use an external/dedicated sound card? If so, try and switch to the default one from the Settings and see if that works. Sometimes multiple soundcards can cause conflict for Spotify, which is when the error occurs.

Hope this helps.

[mikii123]

Hey, thanks for the quick reply. 

No, I do not have an external or dedicated sound card. 

I also took some time to test and see if that could be an issue with platform limitations, but no, no other app from microsoft store has this problem. No other app in general, so far.

[mikii123]

I seem to have found what's up. 

I have the sample rate set to: 384'000Hz.

The highest that spotify can handle without causing the above mentioned issue is: 192'000Hz.

While lowering the sample rate does fix the problem, I would still consider this a bug.

[Joan]

Hi @mikii123,

Thank you for letting us know. We'll cascade this to the appropriate teams so that it can be looked into.

If there's anything else we can do for you, let us know.