queue169

Q: Songs keep repeating when I shuffle a playlist

On every iPod and iPhone I've ever owned:

I open a playlist and set it to shuffle. It does. I pause a song, put the device away, and press play a few hours or days later. The device remembers what I've already played so I don't hear the same song twice until I get through all, say, 250 songs on the playlist (unless I select a different playlist, manually select a song on the playlist, or close the iTunes app on my phone). As an illustration, using my iPhone 6 (still on iOS 8.3) last month I spent a week of commuting time, about 45 minutes a day, listening through a playlist and never heard the same song twice.

 

On my iPhone 6 since updating to iOS 8.4 (12H143):

I open a playlist and set it to shuffle. It does. I pause a song, put the device away, and press play a few hours or days later. It doesn't seem to remember what it's already played, so I end up hearing the same set of about 25-30 songs (with occasional randoms thrown in) every time I pause, put it away, and press play a few hours or days later.

 

Why doesn't Music seem to remember what it's already played? Is there any way of fixing this, or working around the issue so I don't have to keep hearing the same songs on a playlist?

 

On a possibly related note, I just connected my phone to my computer, and noticed that several of the songs that keep getting repeated show up in iTunes as having never been played. Has Music/iTunes stopped counting, or is this feature just not working any longer?

iPhone 6, iOS 8.4

Posted on Jul 23, 2015 9:12 PM

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Q: Songs keep repeating when I shuffle a playlist

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  • by hnnr03,

    hnnr03 hnnr03 Jul 1, 2016 10:36 PM in response to E9TOU
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Jul 1, 2016 10:36 PM in response to E9TOU

    I've been using the Cesium music player app now since March. Unlike the Apple music player app, Cesium shuffles playlists with no subsequent repeats. Cesium also shows the number of songs remaining, like Apple's music player used to do. I only use Cesium these days, saving me the aggravation of having to listen to repeated play list songs ever again. I don't miss the Apple music player app at all. Doubt I will ever go back to it, even if they get their act together and finally resolve this issue. Not holding my breath...

  • by jeff whipple,

    jeff whipple jeff whipple Jul 5, 2016 6:16 PM in response to queue169
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Apple Music
    Jul 5, 2016 6:16 PM in response to queue169
    I don't have this issue on the iMac - just my iPhone 6+ and have had it for a long time - yes I make sure repeat is off every time. I wonder how you take something that worked for years and break it and can't geet it back
  • by crbayless10,

    crbayless10 crbayless10 Jul 6, 2016 11:22 AM in response to hnnr03
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Jul 6, 2016 11:22 AM in response to hnnr03
    Thanks for posting about that app, I'm using now and it is much much better than apple music.
  • by queue169,

    queue169 queue169 Jul 6, 2016 12:42 PM in response to queue169
    Level 1 (14 points)
    Jul 6, 2016 12:42 PM in response to queue169

    Wow. You forget to check in on a thread for almost a year....

     

    I'm thrilled to be still having the same exact problem a year later (my iPhone 6 is currently updated to 9.3.2 [13F69]). And what's really exciting is that now the Music app comes with the helpful ability to reorder songs in the upcoming queue, which is especially great because it finally provides some visual evidence of the shuffle problem:

     

    8812b815-edf7-4211-8e5b-a25f1218d305.png

     

    As a note, I started off this playlist by clicking shuffle. I haven't hit pause, or clicked around, or selected a new track, or done anything else to interfere with the queue except to open it up and look at it. I just listened to "Killing Time" two songs ago, and it's coming up again four songs from now. It's a great song, but I JUST listened to it. (This isn't actually the worst it's ever been. A few weeks ago I was on a long car trip and I had the same song play three times in a row, and was queued up to play again two songs later.)

     

    I have a friend who works in Apple tech support, who gave me the usual "erase and clean install." It didn't work. Is there any hope at this point of getting through to Apple in a way that will actually resolve the problem--especially now that we can visually document it?

  • by Ad Hoc,

    Ad Hoc Ad Hoc Jul 6, 2016 12:44 PM in response to hnnr03
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Jul 6, 2016 12:44 PM in response to hnnr03

    I'm not spending money on an app that just does what iTunes does. Every now and then, if I hear a repeat song, I just turn shuffle off for a song and turn it back on. Works every time. Sure the app is only $2 but it's the principl. Will Apple ever fix this? Don't know but I don't really have even negligible time devoted to switch from shuffle and back.

  • by WaitingWaitingWaiting,

    WaitingWaitingWaiting WaitingWaitingWaiting Jul 7, 2016 2:04 PM in response to queue169
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Jul 7, 2016 2:04 PM in response to queue169

    I can also confirm that wiping your iPhone and setting it up from scratch as a new device did NOT correct the problem, I had a Led Zepplin song play back-to-back 4 songs into my playlist despite their song being in my playlist only once and that playlist having over 100 songs in it.  It'd sure be great if Apple would at least acknowledge the bug and say they're working on a fix, even if we won't get it until September when iOS 10 is released.

     

    Is anyone out there an Apple public beta tester and testing iOS 10? If so are you still seeing this issue?

  • by Jauve,

    Jauve Jauve Jul 13, 2016 7:51 AM in response to queue169
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Apple Music
    Jul 13, 2016 7:51 AM in response to queue169

    Guys. I hit on something.

     

    I was hitting "shuffle" on a 58-song playlist. Then I would navigate to my "Up Next" list: 20 shuffled songs from the playlist. I repeated this many times. Always ONLY 20 songs added! What if it's just repeating our Up Next list, so we're not hearing the whole playlist, just 20 shuffled songs on repeat?

     

    So, I cleared my "Up Next." I went back to my playlist and found the option to "Add to Up Next." Up Next now has 58 songs!!! Okay, but what if it just added the whole playlist, in order? Nope, I repeated this operation and the Up Next list is in a different order every time. Try this out, see if you have any success and report back!

     

    JUST A NOTE: I have not yet listened through the long playlist to see if the problem has been fixed. But it may have been "Up Next" that's been screwing us up for (literally) years. Apple, if this is indeed the source of the problem, shame on you. First, fixing something not broken, and then your employees suggest clean re-installs because your Up Next feature has a weird 20-song limit if inputted from Shuffle? Come on guys...

  • by McCartney 123,

    McCartney 123 McCartney 123 Jul 13, 2016 8:38 AM in response to Jauve
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Jul 13, 2016 8:38 AM in response to Jauve

    That's brilliant!  Worked like a charm.  Thanks for sharing.

  • by McCartney 123,

    McCartney 123 McCartney 123 Jul 13, 2016 9:07 AM in response to Jauve
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Jul 13, 2016 9:07 AM in response to Jauve

    DIsregard.   At first it was adding the list in artist alphabetical order.   But after repeating the clear and add up next a few times, it actually did start to shuffle the whole playlist.   Weird... But it's working.  Thanks again.

  • by Ad Hoc,

    Ad Hoc Ad Hoc Jul 16, 2016 3:34 PM in response to queue169
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Jul 16, 2016 3:34 PM in response to queue169

    I'm testing iOS 10 beta and this playlist is now right below main page of the song being played. Since iOS 10, I see no repeat songs coming up anymore. Before 10, I was seeing sometime duplicates and triplicates on this shuffle "Up Next" list. Maybe, just maybe, Apple is going to be fixing this when 10 is released. Let's hope. I've only been testing it for about 4 days.

  • by Sparky87,

    Sparky87 Sparky87 Jul 17, 2016 12:31 PM in response to Ad Hoc
    Level 1 (14 points)
    iPhone
    Jul 17, 2016 12:31 PM in response to Ad Hoc

    LLet's hope that they did indeed fix this... Unfortunately that won't help anyone on older devices like the 4s' as ios10 is only going to be able to run on certain devices... Looks like older phones yet again get screwed! Here let's break something so that it doesnt work for you but then we will fix it but only for newer devices forcing you to upgrade or leave all together....

  • by jhkim01,

    jhkim01 jhkim01 Jul 19, 2016 11:25 AM in response to Jauve
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Jul 19, 2016 11:25 AM in response to Jauve

    I believe that this worked for me!  One caveat thought - I wasn't going to add each song individually to "Up Next" (what a pain in the butt), so I did it by artist.  All the songs were added into UpNext - but they are in alphabetical order.  I then hit Shuffle All.  The Music App then asked "After playing this, do you want to play the 99 songs you've added to Up Next?"  I clicked Keep Up Next - and it showed 99 songs in random order in Up Next, and then the 99 songs in alphabetical order.  If I clicked "Clear Up Next" - then it was back to the old problems.

     

    Problem partially solved.  It is a real problem to sit there and add all the songs (or albums) to Up Next manually.

  • by jhkim01,

    jhkim01 jhkim01 Jul 20, 2016 6:10 AM in response to jhkim01
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Jul 20, 2016 6:10 AM in response to jhkim01

    Not completely solved.

     

    First - you don't have to add all the songs to Up Next. Just add one song.  Then shuffle all songs, and it will ask you to Keep Up Next.  If you do that, it will add all the songs shuffled before the one song that you added manually.

     

    But the original problem I had (where during a shuffle, the Repeat button turns on and can't be turned off, and subsequently songs are shuffled but some songs start to repeat themselves) IS STILL OCCURRING.

     

    Time to move to Cesium.

  • by B_Craw,

    B_Craw B_Craw Jul 21, 2016 8:53 AM in response to jhkim01
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Jul 21, 2016 8:53 AM in response to jhkim01

    I've just upgraded from an iPhone 4s on iOS 7.1.2 where this isn't an issue at all to an iPhone 6 on iOS 9.3.2

     

    I've noticed today that there's the update iOS 9.3.3 - after installing this i can't work out if it's fixed this issue or not, has anybody had chance to check this?

  • by WaitingWaitingWaiting,

    WaitingWaitingWaiting WaitingWaitingWaiting Jul 21, 2016 11:10 AM in response to B_Craw
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Jul 21, 2016 11:10 AM in response to B_Craw

    9.3.3 has NOT fixed this bug. After it had installed on my phone I selected a playlist, hit shuffle and then immediately checked Up Next only to see that my first song was already going to repeat four songs later. This particular playlist has 509 songs in it so to see a repeat so soon was really disappointing.

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