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 B_Craw,

    B_Craw B_Craw Jul 22, 2016 1:07 AM in response to WaitingWaitingWaiting
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Jul 22, 2016 1:07 AM in response to WaitingWaitingWaiting

    Yeah i shuffled one of my playlists last night and found the problem still exists!!

     

    I heard somebody mention the app Cesium earlier in this Thread; can someone confirm that this app will shuffle my playlist and not repeat a song until i restart the shuffle?

  • by hnnr03,

    hnnr03 hnnr03 Jul 22, 2016 8:27 AM in response to B_Craw
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Jul 22, 2016 8:27 AM in response to B_Craw

    For the 4 months or so that I've been using Cesium, it has only repeated a playlist song one or two times out of the hundreds of playlists that I've listened to in that time. Cesium has been vastly better than the Apple music player app in that regard. One note of caution though... Cesium uses the same "up next" listing as the Apple music app. The "recently played" listing will also match. Thus, switching back and forth between those two apps may cause the problem to resurface in Cesium. I've not tried doing this enough to rule out that possibility, since I hate the thought of having to go through the aggravation of trying the Apple music app again. I can't say for certain, but I suspect the Cesium app looks for the repeating playlist song problem to occur in its upcoming song list and takes steps to avoid it if/when it does. Given that the up next and recently played listings are shared between these apps (as well as some other music apps that I've tried), those features appear to be separate background features on all Apple devices. That is where the problem seems to lie. The Apple music app isn't capable of detecting and avoiding repeated playlist songs, while the Cesium app is. The same goes for skipped songs, though I've had Cesium skip playlist songs a few more times than it has repeated playlist songs. One definite Cesium advantage though, when it comes to looking for these problems, Cesium provides a count of the number of playlist songs remaining in its upcoming songs listing.  Apple's music app hasn't done that since these problems started to occur back in IOS 8.4.

  • by Shima5142,

    Shima5142 Shima5142 Aug 18, 2016 11:10 AM in response to queue169
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Aug 18, 2016 11:10 AM in response to queue169

    When you are viewing the song, at the top right just below the total song length is where the shuffle icon appears. It shows in blue when shuffle is active and white when it is not.

    On the top left, just below the current time for the song is an icon with two arrows "chasing" each other. They are white when repeat is inactive, blue when repeat full playlist is active and blue with a tiny number "1" when repeat 1 song is active.

    I suspect that you have the repeat 1 song option set. Tap that icon once more to turn it off. Then shuffle should work as expected.

    Hope that helps. It worked for me

  • by jhkim01,

    jhkim01 jhkim01 Aug 18, 2016 12:58 PM in response to Shima5142
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Aug 18, 2016 12:58 PM in response to Shima5142

    Yes - I get that. You should read what the problem is - the repeat icon turns itself on, and cannot be turned off. It is unresponsive.

  • by Almostadr,

    Almostadr Almostadr Aug 25, 2016 4:39 AM in response to queue169
    Level 1 (8 points)
    Aug 25, 2016 4:39 AM in response to queue169

    I am so glad I found this discussion. I thought I was cracking up, or doing something wrong. I have a playlist of 400+ songs which I listen to through a Bluetooth in helmet headphones when on my motorcycle. So it is very difficult to mess about with skipping songs etc. What it plays is what I get. My problem like everyone else is that every time I listen to this playlist on shuffle I hear the same 20 or 30 songs. I recently went away for 4 days, and listened to the playlist for 20+ hours and kept hearing the same songs over and over. Arghhh!

    I have tried all of the solutions above, including wiping an reinstalling, deleting "up next" etc etc and nothing works. I have just upgraded to iOS 9.3.4 and still the fault remains.  The problem is in the Apple Music app, obviously.

    When I look closely in iTunes, 20 or 30 or so of the songs have been played 15-20 times each, while over 100 have had 1 or zero plays. Shuffle the whole list? You're joking!

    I don't want anything fancy, I don't need to see album artwork, or shuffle albums, or genra, or artists or sort classical music by composer. I just want it to shuffle my playlist randomly, without repeating. Not much to ask, surely?

    A few days ago I lashed out $1.50 and downloaded Ecoute Beautiful Music Player app. It has solved my problem. It instantly picked up all the music and playlists on my iPhone, and does what I want it to do. It shuffles my playlist properly. The only caveat is I have only had it a few days.

    It has a lovely simple interface, and looks good.  Maybe it does other things that people want. I don't know or care. I also don't particularly care how it looks either, although it does look good.  I open it, find my playlist, hit play and shuffle and put it in my pocket.

    And it works.

    It doesn't talk directly to iTunes that I can see. It appears to suck the information out of Apple Music, so if you are constantly downloading or buying new music that may be unpleasant for you. But it is not an issue for me. I'm a dinosaur and listen mainly to my 60s and 70 music, and have no interest in changing it. Yes, I'm a dinosaur, but a happy one.

    So, in summary.......a big raspberry to Apple for not fixing this problem, and congratulation to Ecoute for solving my problem for under $2.

    Cheers      Almostadr

  • by jhkim01,

    jhkim01 jhkim01 Sep 9, 2016 7:04 PM in response to Almostadr
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Sep 9, 2016 7:04 PM in response to Almostadr

    I have switched to Cesium, and so far the "repeat" issue when shuffling songs has not occurred!

  • by EchoBaby,

    EchoBaby EchoBaby Sep 16, 2016 11:04 AM in response to jhkim01
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Sep 16, 2016 11:04 AM in response to jhkim01

    Hi all, has anyone updated to ios 10 yet and checked to see if the shuffle is still repeating? I've made several calls to support about this issue. I'm trying to be optimistic hoping with the new ios 10 update it will fix this issue  wishful thinking.

  • by TCPlano,

    TCPlano TCPlano Sep 26, 2016 10:45 AM in response to MajorIP4
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Sep 26, 2016 10:45 AM in response to MajorIP4

    Why is everyone marking MarjorlP4 answer as helpful. It did not answer the question asked and there is as of yet still no solution posted for this annoying problem. I actually have about 12 gigs of songs on my Ipod Touch and i go to all songs and hit play and then shuffle it.. so theoretically it could play over 115 hours without repeating a song. But no it repeats many of the same songs and never plays others. I walk 1.4 hours a day while listining and I don't want to pick out songs individually but this is annoying that Ipod and Iphone 6 do this. I am plenty computer and pc and ios savvy and I've seen no practical solution other that creating a huge playlist with a specific order and playing it without shuffle. That's just a pain in the..too much time.

  • by TCPlano,

    TCPlano TCPlano Sep 26, 2016 10:55 AM in response to queue169
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Sep 26, 2016 10:55 AM in response to queue169

    I have this problem as well with the Ipod touch and the 15 gigs of music on there. I go to all songs play a song then shuffle and it will play from my all songs randomly but for some reason it repeats many of the same songs and does not play others. While I see no easy solution there is one way but it is actually a time consuming pain and probably not worth the trouble. But.. solution: You create a large playlist from your songs that you have copied and manually renamed in an numeric or alphabetical order in the tags so that let say you have 100 songs with named 001somthing through 100something. Then create playlist and play without shuffle.

    Or (without doing the above suggestion)

    you could just go to all songs hit play on the first one turn off shuffle and just listen to all songs in alphabetical/track order.

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