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Make Music widget stop showing what other family members are listening to

Whenever someone else in the house plays music on a HomePod, the Apple Music widget appears on my phone and shows me what they are listening to. It's annoying! And I can't figure out how to make it stop. I don't want my phone to show me what's playing on another device unless I played it there. This happened in iOS 15 and it still happens in iOS 16.


If I can't fix this I'd just as soon kill the Music widget entirely as it's not that useful. Oh, and it does this on my watch also, just to be extra intrusive and annoying.


Anybody know how to control this?

iPhone 12 Pro Max

Posted on Sep 26, 2022 10:29 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Sep 30, 2022 5:41 AM

Thanks. This is on the lock screen. The device is our HomePod (the old original one!) and it is on my iCloud account. When my husband (who is in our family group) plays music on it, the music widget appears on my lock screen, which is not what ought to happen because it's annoying (I am upstairs working, I glance at my locked phone to see an notification or something, and instead I see this giant music widget telling me what is playing downstairs, and because I can then actually change what is playing elsewhere in the house (OK, that can be fun, but not nice to do!).


We have done two things that *seem* to have fixed it (but it's only been about a day so who knows) -


  • The last time it came up, I tapped on the widget and unchecked "HomePod". It went away, but I think it turned up again later.
  • I checked his phone and in the Home app, the choice to have Siri recognize his voice individually was not activated. I activated it. My theory was that with that unchecked, Siri thought everything was coming from me, and therefore showed it on my phone.


We'll keep an eye on it but honestly, this is WAY TOO COMPLICATED. There should be something in the support docs explaining how this works so we could all just set it up the way we want it to work. Instead I've been looking at YouTube videos and stuff like that trying to find some answer.


Thanks!

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4 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Sep 30, 2022 5:41 AM in response to Lee_ms

Thanks. This is on the lock screen. The device is our HomePod (the old original one!) and it is on my iCloud account. When my husband (who is in our family group) plays music on it, the music widget appears on my lock screen, which is not what ought to happen because it's annoying (I am upstairs working, I glance at my locked phone to see an notification or something, and instead I see this giant music widget telling me what is playing downstairs, and because I can then actually change what is playing elsewhere in the house (OK, that can be fun, but not nice to do!).


We have done two things that *seem* to have fixed it (but it's only been about a day so who knows) -


  • The last time it came up, I tapped on the widget and unchecked "HomePod". It went away, but I think it turned up again later.
  • I checked his phone and in the Home app, the choice to have Siri recognize his voice individually was not activated. I activated it. My theory was that with that unchecked, Siri thought everything was coming from me, and therefore showed it on my phone.


We'll keep an eye on it but honestly, this is WAY TOO COMPLICATED. There should be something in the support docs explaining how this works so we could all just set it up the way we want it to work. Instead I've been looking at YouTube videos and stuff like that trying to find some answer.


Thanks!

Sep 28, 2022 10:59 AM in response to John Whiteside

Hi John Whiteside,


To clarify, you don't have widgets setup for music on your device, but when someone else plays music on your HomePod the widget appears with the song? Is this on your Home Screen or Lock Screen? Do the other devices playing the music belong to you or share your iCloud account? This should help us narrow down your issue better.


We look forward to hearing back from you.


Take care.

Sep 30, 2022 5:55 AM in response to green500

Well - let's not call it resolved until we get through a week with it behaving properly!


This really needs to be better documented. I've been chatting with a friend on Twitter (their household is chock full of iphones and homepods and all) and they have had the exact same issue and have given up in frustration. These are your most loyal customers, don't make it so hard for them to be happy with their Apple products!

Make Music widget stop showing what other family members are listening to

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