Music playing on HomePod continuously showing up on iPhone Lock Screen and Apple Watch

Things do seem to have improved since the iOS 17.2 update. There are still a number of fundamental flaws to the whole system though.

If 'auto launch audio apps' in your Apple Watch settings is set to 'on,' this will launch the Now Playing app on the watch and show what's playing on nearby HomePods.

This will also force your iPhone to show controls for the same thing - and switch the outputs of media apps to the same thing.

If you switch off 'auto launch audio apps' in your Apple Watch, your iPhone should just show a collapsed notification / widget on its' lock screen showing the nearest device and what's playing. Only when you tap this, does it reveal controls and switch the output of media apps to another device.

The system and all the devices are riddled with bugs, inconsistencies and design faults though. For example, on a couple of occasions, after charging, my Apple Watch has switched on 'auto launch media apps' regardless of the setting on screen. Rebooting sorted this. iPhone notifications of what's playing nearby sometimes work and sometimes don't. More often than not, the TV Remote app doesn't affect Now Playing on iPhone (that's expected & logical behaviour) but occasionally it will.

This is the sort of incompetence and lack of usability I used to slag off Samsung for. Now it's Apple.

Agree it was really annoying me on my Watch face every time I was using my HomePods. Only solution that worked was on your Watch go to settings, general, auto-launch… and toggle off. You still get a discrete icon on top of Watch face but that is all.

I have stopped using my Apple Watch and this has solved most of the problems. Before 10.1, I noticed that when I raised the watch, it seemed to scan for devices and would flash up the music icon, then force the iphone to show whats playing on a homepod. This continued with handoff off and with the watches wifi off.

I updated to 10.1 last night, hoping they might have fixed it. They have not. if anything, it seems to connect to other devices more immediately after I have chosen which device I want it to control . . . Itself believe it or not!?

With the watch off completely, the rest of the system runs relatively peacefully again.

Hi ry.sp.wil,

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Hope this helps!

Have a great day.

Well y’all, after updating to iOS 17.2 and watchOS 10.2 the problem seems to have gotten better. Not sure how to turn it off completely on the watch, but when it pops up on my iPhone I have the option to swipe across to clear the “notification” at least. Still annoying but far easier than needing to tap through and control another device!

Having exactly the same problems. Additionally, the standby feature in ios17 is rendered (truly) useless because it’s overridden by a now playing screen that shows whats playing on a homepod somewhere.

How on earth they can think constantly forcing all my devices to control other devices all the time is helping me - is beyond me.

Having exactly the same problems. Additionally, the standby feature in ios17 is rendered (truly) useless because it’s overridden by a now playing screen that shows whats playing on a homepod somewhere.

How on earth they can think constantly forcing all my devices to control other devices all the time is helping me - is beyond me.

It's super frustrating. Even though I've stopped a radio station playing from Tunein on my HomePod mini, it keeps taking over the audio output on my iPhone, so I can't connect my AirPods. I first have to restart my iPhone or leave the room for a while before I can connect my AirPods if I want to listen to apple music directly from my iPhone.

Same here! We have a iHeartRadio station playing throughout the day that I have no need to control. Super annoying because I don’t want it showing up on the Lock Screen or Dynamic Island for that matter. Also super frustrating because I want to play music from my phone but I forget and it AirPlays to the HomePod. 🙄

Same issue, how about an option to stop me seeing on my phone and watch what other family members are playing on the bloody homepods, it's really frustrating at this point having my screen taking up by what other people may be playing when I don't care, turning off all hand off features does not turn this feature off like it did in iOS 16 for some reason.

Worst feature ever implemented, I don't want my homescreen taken up by music some random family member plays on some random homepod. If I want to control my music from other devices then I will do it myself. If I switch to my iPhone in a few secs or a minute it just shows whats on a homepod again and this can't be stopped until all homepods are paused.

Here is a suggestion for Apple, if the homepod knows who's speaking then just show those music controls on that persons device only, not the entire family. So if I ask to play music then only my own personal devices will see whats playing and not anyone else. This problem is not only an annoyance it's a serious privacy issue.

Don't know why this would be too hard to implement considering Siri knows who's voice it is for personal feedback.

I have HomePods playing all the time so now I never even see my watch face because every time I lift my wrist I see the album art of the HomePod playing. There needs to be a setting to COMPLETELY DECOUPLE the HomePod from iPhones, watches, etc. I NEVER want to see them on my devices. If they don't fix this I'm done with HomePod. This issue is one of the most annoying issues I've ever dealt with being an Apple user and I am so so sick and tired of it.

I have HomePods playing all the time so now I never even see my watch face because every time I lift my wrist I see the album art of the HomePod playing. I never want to see them on my devices. If they don't fix this I'm done with HomePod. This issue is one of the most annoying issues I've ever dealt with being an Apple user and I am so so sick and tired of it.

When HomePods are playing a radio station, it overwrites what I am playing on my iPhone ( when not in use)

so frustrating as I then have to reload my playlists on my phone.

This needs sorting ASAP, cmon Apple get it sorted.

You can add me to the list of very frustrated users of the HomePod, I HATE how my watch and my iPhone show “now playing” on the HomePod, even when watching TV. It also happens on my wife’s iPhone and our iPad Pro. I love the HomePod but this issue is really frustrating and if it isn’t resolved I might return it. I tried turning off airplay on our phones and it persists, I also turned off hand off and on my Apple TV I turned off airplay for everyone as well but the issues persist. Does anyone have an update for this? Is it something that Apple is working on or are we stuck with this really annoying issue?

Same issue for me. I absolutely HATE this.