Rating songs with Siri stopped working (iOS 15.1.1 Music app, not service)

Sorry if this is the wrong place--it's not at all obvious where this question belongs.


I've been using my iPhone and Siri to rate the songs in my music library. For months I've been playing the songs with the Music app on my iPhone (started on a 6S, currently on a 13) and rating them with "Hey Siri, rate this song [###] stars". It's been working great, including the start of today, with Siri responding "Okay, I've rated it a [###] out of 5" or "Okay, I've rated it [###] stars".


Some time today that stopped working. The only responses I get now are "Sorry, I can't do that" or "Sorry, I can't help you with that". All other Music related commands still seem to work. I can rate the songs manually via the ••• menu.


I've tried turning data off and on, wi-fi off and on, restarting the phone, installing 15.1.1 update... Nothing works.


It was working, then it wasn't. No indication of what changed or what the problem is. This is incredibly frustrating.


The songs are played from a smart list called Unrated, but it also doesn't work if I navigate to the songs via Artists, Albums, Songs...

iPhone 13, iOS 15

Posted on Nov 19, 2021 10:15 PM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Nov 24, 2021 2:38 PM

I contacted Apple Support, https://getsupport.apple.com/, selected my iPhone -> Apps and Features -> Topic not listed and described the issue as "iPhone, Siri no longer allows rating the currently playing song". Then I selected chat. I gave the rep a link to this community discussion and told her that others were having the same issue. After some back and forth, I asked if apple was aware of the issue. She finally said "I'd like to set a callback for you with a specialized department to report and try to solve your issue". I said yes! I got a call immediately from someone who was much more technically savvy. We discussed the issue and he reviewed this discussion. He said that the problem had not been reported to Apple and that they did not usually look for issues in the community discussions. He said he agreed that it was a back end problem and would submit a problem report to the developers. So, if everyone goes through the same exercise, it might help get this issue fixed.



[Personal Information Edited by Moderator]

44 replies

Jan 25, 2022 6:37 AM in response to PoeticVampire

I don't think this was a mistake, bug, or accident. With this backend change having occurred months ago without update or resolution, I think it's safe to assume that Apple is just removing the functionality from Siri to be able to rate your songs.

It really really stinks.

It stinks that they make this change and hide that they made the change and prefer to let users contact support.

It stinks that they are impacting visually impaired users disproportionately when they degrade Siri functionality.

It stinks that with so much of your phone's function being "software as a service" that is subject to change without notice and without transparency.


There's a lot I love about Apple, but this stuff burns me up. I hope they realize that every time this problem is mentioned, there are multitudes of users who are quietly annoyed.


But hey, I hope they prove me wrong and fix the Siri backend to enable song rating again.

Mar 2, 2022 11:16 AM in response to Shin_G

Well the shortcut solution works very well so thanks for that idea.. I am glad I read through this discussion. I thought My phone was just behaving badly on its own. The shortcut is a great solution, however it does not change the fact that Apple has broken a long-existing functionality and forced us to program shortcuts to re-activate it. Also, of course there is the additional work of reviewing the lists and starring and cleaning out the songs that accumulate in them, but yes,, its a HUGE help, so thanks again! Come on Apple. Don't break stuff that's been working since before most people even had a smart phone.

Nov 23, 2021 6:22 PM in response to Matt Tuley

Thank you for posting, I've been driving myself mad the past few days on multiple devices with different OS levels on this issue as I curate many smart playlists using song ratings over CarPlay. Unbelievable that they're screwing with ratings yet again after temporarily taking them away, the ongoing fiasco of "album ratings" polluting my individual songs, and now this! It's so unbelievably frustrating, I would happily pay for Apple Music if it had even half of the functionality that real music fans desire. Apple - get this fixed ASAP!!!

Dec 2, 2021 1:06 PM in response to Ken Davies

Same problem here and while I appreciate the shortcuts idea I really am looking fit Apple to fix this. My library pre-dates iTunes so I have over a decade curating my library and a large part of my organization revolves around star ratings. I have dozens of smart playlists that all leverage the ratings. First Apple attempted to replace the stars with the on or off heart option, like there’s no levels of like. 😩


Similar to someone earlier in the thread, I use an unrated playlist in the case on long drives and Siri to taste them. It’s not safe to do it on the phone while driving, so Apple it’s a safety issue as well.


please restore this functionality.

Feb 6, 2022 6:51 PM in response to msferatu

I was then ecstatic when Apple added rating songs to Siri.. Suddenly my phone was ACTUALLY safe to use in the car! Perhaps I could FINALLY let go of my clickwheel iPod!! (where you can rate practically without looking quick and easy..)


I was seriously weirded out/angry that the recipricol command, "how many stars?" seemed to simply not be part of the new functionality..


Now I'm angrier than ever that something I hugely valued has been broken (by this threads time stamps) for months now..


Sure seems to give creedence to some of the theories presented..


We love music. We've had access to iTunes for decades. Apple CANNOT jeopardize the cumulative work in rating song libraries around the world, but I guess it's okay to discourage it.. Like when "love" tried to push ratings out of the way.. Grrr..


+1 for A) fixing this, and B) adding "Hey Siri! How many stars does this song have?" (and permutations.. How hard can it be?)


Feb 8, 2022 10:58 AM in response to msferatu

Just to add to the problem, the shortcut idea from earlier in this thread would work but for a couple of problems (Apple related, not the person who came up with the idea). First, it only works occasionally if you use Siri on your watch and secondly the additions to the "Rating" playlists seem toe be stuck on my phone. They don't sync to my iPad or Mac, not even to music.apple.com.


This is getting seriously frustrating.

Feb 12, 2022 10:54 AM in response to Ken Davies

The shortcut solution was working for me, but stopped about 3 weeks ago. Basically, when I invoke one of the rating shortcuts, the currently playing song gets added to the playlist on my iPhone. When I check that playlist on my MacBook, the song's not there. Interestingly, if I manually add a song to that playlist from my phone, it magically appears on the playlist on my MacBook. So the issue is once again linked to Siri. I tried logging out from iCloud and back in to no avail. I finally discovered a workaround. If I rename the playlist on my iPhone, it forces the songs to update in the playlist on my MacBook. (I still have to manually update the ratings and delete the songs from the playlist after that.) So yet another kludgy step is added to get song ratings to work. Meanwhile, there have been like 4 iOS updates since this was first reported and no fix. WTF!!!

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Rating songs with Siri stopped working (iOS 15.1.1 Music app, not service)

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