Apple watch does not make all playlists available when not connected to phone

[david369]

Plan

Premium

Country

Device

Apple Watch 3

Operating System

Watch OS 7.1

My Question or Issue

When the watch is not connected to the phone using the new streaming feature, the watch only allows the first 20 playlists to be loaded (when you scroll down it doesn't 'load more'). 

When connected to the phone this works fine, it continually loads a further set of playlists.

The new streaming feature is great but this limitation means I can't use most of the playlists once I'm out and about without the phone.

Would appreciate if there is a way to resolve this to fully make the most of streaming.

Many thanks

David

[Elena]

Hey there @david369,

Thanks for posting about this and welcome to the Community 🙂

We recommend making sure that you have the latest version of the app - you can check that on the Apple Store.

If your app is up to date, try logging out, restarting your phone and your watch, and logging back in.

If this doesn't do the trick, it's worth running a clean reinstall by following these steps. This can be helpful to get rid of any cached files that might be causing trouble.

If the issue persists, can you let us know if it happens over WiFi, 3G/4G, or both?

Keep us posted. We'll be on the lookout.

[david369]

• Hello thanks for the reply. 
  
  

I followed the steps and completely deleted the app and reinstalled. unfortunately the streaming feature has now completely gone. Before there was an option to Play on device “watch” which has now gone. 

I have restarted the watch and phone several times. 

Frustrating to be worse off than previously. Would appreciate any support in restoring this ability to stream through the watch. 

Thanks

david

[david369]

Hello, so after completely deleting the spotify app, the spotify watch app eventually connected again. To answer your original question, the problem with the limited playlists still persists. It happens on both wifi and cellular connection

Seems like a limitation with the app. Would be good to know if this is by design and if there is a plan to improve this?

thanks

David

[Jeremy]

Hey there @david369,

Thank you for your reply. We're sorry to hear that you still experience this.

Can you let us know which version of the app you have?

We'll keep an eye out for your reply.

Cheers!

[david369]

Hi thanks for getting back to me. 
app version is 8.5.86.739

thanks

david

[Jeremy]

Hey @david369,

Thank you for your reply and confirmation.

Can you disconnect the watch from your phone and then connect it again to see if the issue persist?

Keep us posted 🙂

[david369]

Hello, I unpaired and paired the watch with a complete reset.

Now streaming on the Spotify watch app is completely broken again! 😞

When I put the phone in airplane mode, and click on "david's apple watch" it just gets stuck on connecting. 

For comparison I then try Apple Music app to verify that the wifi/cellular connectivity is OK, and it works fine.

So far I've tried

-uninstalling and re-installing app

-unpairing and re-paring watch

-turning off and on watch countless times

-2 different sets of wireless headphones (airpods and bose qc35)

This is almost becoming too much hassle but I'm willing to persevere a while longer, but honestly the alternative that "just works" is looking tempting right now.

The app is now completely unusable for streaming so any suggestions (ideally that don't involve me spending hours deleting and unpairing again...) would be appreciated.

I've attached a video showing the connecting problem.

thank you for your assistance
david

[Jeremy]

Hey there @david369,

Thank you for your reply and confirmation.

We doublechecked this from our end and this seems to be expected behavior.

You can also hit Library and swap between playlists, podcasts, artists and albums and browse options within, playing any track you feel like. You won't get all the options in your library, but you'll get an extensive list of the most recently played 20 or so.

And if you swipe to the right, you'll get a list of tracks within the currently selected playlist so you can select the exact song you want to listen to. There's no limit there.

Also - if you don't have internet connection you're not able to use connect.

If you have any questions we're always one reply away. We're happy to help 🙂

Take care!

[Mtbmillsy]

Just ran across your post and I have experienced the exact same conditions you have described with a limit of 20 playlists. I also tried every combination of deleting and reinstalling Spotify on both watch and phone to no avail but I did stumble across a sort of workable solution. I used the Spotify app on my home pc to reorder my playlists to the 20 most important to me and voila it works on the watch. I’ve only done it once since I discovered this but hoping it will work indefinitely until Spotify fixes the problem.

[Amit6]

Hi

is there any way to solve the maximum 20 albums issue?

 Thanks 

[Eni]

Hey @Amit6,

Thanks for reaching out about this here in the Community. 

We can confirm that this is expected behavior of the app. 

We appreciate you taking the time to share your feedback with us and will make sure to pass it onto the right team, as we always strive to improve your experience.

Also, make sure to keep the app updated so you don't miss out on any possible improvements in the future. 

If you need help with anything else, just let us know. 

Cheers!

[adamplavecz]

Hi,

Any updates on the matter? I just bought a GPS + Cellular Apple Watch SE and subscribed to your premium service to be able to listen to music without my phone while working out, running etc. I started arranging my music collection on the PC app, and soon bumped into the 20 playlist limit. Now this sucks big time, especially if you want to arrange your collection the way I want to: into folders with artist names, because this way one release will be one playlist, so all you can have on your watch is 20 releases.

I also ran into a 256 playlist limit on the iPhone, but that's managable, since I can still see my entire folder strucure, with all the 256+ releases (in 44 folders so far), it's just the playlist counter that stops at 256.

But back to the watch, I'm much more bummed about that. There's one more issue here too: when connected to the iPhone, the playlist order is 'recently played' which doesn't make any sense. I want an alphabetical order which the PC app and the iPhone do without an issue, but no matter what I select on the iPhone (the watch is supposed to mirror that), the watch still shows them by date.

[adamplavecz]

One more thing: the watch doesn't even display my folder structure in standalone mode. It only shows the playlists (releases) within my folders, and since they are in alphabetical order, it goes up only to 'C' (the 20th album happens to be from Carbon Based Lifeforms). So yeah, my custom ('creator', alphabetical) order in standalone mode, 'recently played' when connected to my iPhone. Seeing the 'creator' structure would be much more intuitive and comfortable to use...

[Kiril]

Hey there @adamplavecz,

Thanks for posting and welcome to the Community!

We'd like you to know that for technical reasons, the Apple Watch does have some limitations in place, and this is something outside of our influence. As we perceive this, the Apple Watch is meant more to compliment your iPhone device, allowing for quick access and control of the apps there, but cannot replace it fully at this time.

Hope this helps clarify things. Don't hesitate to give us a shout if there's anything else we can help with.

[bcsize1]

Hello, as a Spotify Premium user and a new apple watch owner, I believe I am having a similar problem described in this thread. When my watch is connected to my iPhone, the playlists on my apple watch is synced just fine. However, when my iPhone is disconnected, my watch only shows a limited number of playlists and in an order I did not assign (Which I believe can get annoying when going on a run and you can’t play the playlist you were wanting to). My watch seems to display it in the “recently added” order by itself when not connected to my iPhone. I don’t know. Anyways, any feedback or help on this problem would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

[MattSh]

I come across the same problem, and I see from the comments  that there is no solution.

That really sucks because I love my Spotify playlists, and now I have to make same playlist on Apple Watch in order to play tracks I like without having the phone while working out/running. 
I really hope for some solution in the future.