iOS 13 music: turning on Shuffle turns off Repeat
I teach group fitness, so on all my playlists my default choice is repeat all, no shuffle. In the past, if I did want to shuffle a playlist, I would always choose the big Shuffle button at the top right (next to the big Play button), and the result was it shuffled my playlist but kept the repeat setting on. When it had gone through every song in the playlist on shuffle, it just kept going, but with an entirely new random shuffle. I could listen to a playlist ad infinitem and the chances of hearing the same two songs back to back were pretty small. Interestingly, when I swiped up to the Now Playing tab and clicked the three dots or whatever the old setting was to find the tiny shuffle and repeat icons, the shuffle icon would be dark (even though it was technically shuffling), and the repeat icon would be highlighted. In other words, clicking the Shuffle button did not change my normal settings.
Since upgrading to iOS 13, hitting the big Shuffle button automatically turns off repeat. I can verify this by swiping up on the Now Playing tab, clicking the shuffle/repeat menu icon on the bottom right, and seeing that the little Shuffle icon is highlighted, the Repeat is not. When the playlist ends, it does not start again. If I manually go in and turn repeat on, it will repeat the shuffled playlist... but in the same order every time. It does not get to the end and reshuffle like it used to.
If I choose the big Play button, it plays the playlist straight, but Repeat is off. On the other hand, if I just click the first song in the playlist, it will play straight through with Repeat on. This is good news because it means I don't have to scramble to make sure my settings are correct for my group fitness classes (play straight, repeat on).
But it sure is irritating to have to restart and reshuffle the playlist at the end every time, when Apple Music used to take care of this for me. It's also irritating to have my shuffled playlist start all over again, clearly in the same order. That's jarringly boring, it defeats the purpose of shuffling to begin with. Why am I having to do all the work now, Apple? You had a good thing going and now you "shuffled" it all up.
iPhone XR, iOS 13