iPhone 17 Pro Max speaker volume fluctuates during songs

It happens on some songs. Not all. Also, not only on songs.

I can't remember a specific example, but hear this:

Are you familiar with the situation when sometimes you hear a song, then you play an Instagram video simultaneously, and the IG lowers the music's volume?

Now let's say that this specific IG video is silent in most of it, so it results in a low volume music + low music video (because the video lowers the music volume). When it goes below a certain threshold (too low), the iPhone speakers will reduce the volume even more, and on the moment the IG video will have a louder part, both the IG video and the Music will jump up in volume.

Every time you hear something that's below a certain threshold, the iPhone will reduce the volume and filter it - and jump back up when the audio source passes the threshold again.

It has nothing to do with the music dynamics or anything like that. If you have a new iPhone (or a new IOS version, because I believe this is not a hardware but a software issue) you have to notice it on certain occasions, and if you don't, well, I don't think it helps when you keep trying to show people how this issue doesn't exist (I saw this behavior on some of your comments), because it DOES exist, and you clearly just don't have the ears to notice that, although it's pretty noticeable.

You can try listening in full volume to songs like: "IU - Love Poem" (volume jumps up the moment she starts to sing), "LeeHi - HOLO" - (Also jumps up when she starts singing), "Alan & JJ & May Twik - טאק בום בום" It's in hebrew but you can find it on one of the artists' pages (All the start jumps up and down in volume, and you can clearly hear the bass sound coming back to life when all the other instruments come in on 0:08).

Try hearing those songs on speakers of an iPhone that has the latest IOS version (optimally iPhone 17) and then hear it on your PC or connect the phone to a Bluetooth speaker. You'll immediately hear the difference.

Honestly, I can't believe this is still going for so long and Apple didn't fix it.

Also, make sure you have all audio enhancement features turned off such as spacial audio enhancement, Dolby Atmos, 3D audio, etc.

As I mentioned before, the problem is not present when using headphone

And that is why I suspect it could be a phase cancelation issue.

its only when playing through the speakers.

Ok, then make sure all audio processing is turned off, then try external Bluetooth speakers and see if the issue happens with them.

But if you add a compressor that only reacts to certain frequencies on an already compressed track, you would get this drastic bad fluctuations

I understand what you are saying but I seriously doubt the iPhone has a multi band compressor in it.

1000songs wrote:

my iPhone 17 has noticeable volume fluctuations when using the native speaker. Not when using external/Bluetooth speakers. It’s infuriating.

If this is while listening to music or podcasts the iPhone will reduce volume briefly whenever a notification arrives, so you can hear the notification. The simple test is to put the phone in Mute mode using the Action Button above the volume controls. If you have reprogrammed that button for some function other than Mute you can also mute those notifications by opening the Control Center by dragging down from the battery icon, and tapping the bell icon. The Mute function just suppresses notifications, such as the phone ringer or other notifications, it does not affect streaming content.

Its like they added a compressor to the audio system.

Actually a compressor would do the exact opposite, it would compress all audio to the same level.

Let's try an experiment. Are the headphones you are using Bluetooth? If so, try using a pair of Bluetooth speakers and see if it still happens. This might be a phase canceling issue.

Since headphones go over your ears and the sound from one speaker can't interfere with the sound from the other speaker, phase cancelation can't happen.

With Bluetooth speakers, you can have phase cancelation and if the same volume effect happens with the internal speakers along with the Bluetooth speakers, then it's a phasing issue.

If you don't get the issue with the Bluetooth speakers then you know it's an issue with the audio signal being sent to the internal speakers.

Ochiboy wrote:

It confirmed my suspicions that it's not just an isolated case, but instead is widespread.

How widespread? There are roughly 2 billion iPhones, and roughly 500 million have iOS 26. If this was “widespread” that would mean something like 10 million to 500 million have the problem. That clearly isn’t the case, because if it were you would see millions of comments on it, not a dozen.

Have you tried changing settings/Sounds & Haptics? Specifically Volume Limit and Reduce Loud Sounds.

Hi, I'd like drop-in and say that I am experiencing the exact same issue with my iPhone 17 Pro Max (Cosmic Orange).

One specific song that's a good example is the "Sparkle - Movie Ver." from the movie "Your Name". Regardless of where I play the song, Apple Music, Spotify, or even Youtube, the issue is that when it's only the instrumental, the volume is noticeably lower, even if the phone is at max volume.

When the vocals kick in (around 00:32), the volume goes up to what it should be, then goes down again when the instrumental kicks in. So basically, throughout the song, the volume goes up and down, or in other words, fluctuates.

I've also tried check what settings I can change, but I couldn't find a fix.

Using earphones doesn't seem to have issues though. The issue only lies with the phone speakers.

It's not just tracks, it happens even Youtube videos as well. I stumbled upon this video while doom scrolling: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/thIGUI5IShg and noticed that the same issue occur.

On parts where only the Canon piano plays, it will sound muted/muffled, but when the audio is mixed with the audio from the badminton match, the volume will go loud/normal level.

It looks like the volume will not go muted/muffled when there are constant "background noise" on the audio played.

It confirmed my suspicions that it's not just an isolated case, but instead is widespread.

I don't have to RMA my device if it's an innate issue for many, and can be fixed by a software update.

This needs to be fixed.

I confirm that I have the same issue, plus I checked on friends' iPhones, and they have the same issue, plus I checked a showcase iPhone 17 Pro Max on an Apple Distributor store, and I noticed the same issue. I'm pretty sure it's software related and I hope the next IOS version will fix that. As a musician I'm finding it very frustrating to have such an issue on a brand-new phone.

AMANOProd wrote:

Honestly, I can't believe this is still going for so long and Apple didn't fix it.

Honestly, it is still going on for you, not a hundred million other iPhones.

Honestly, there is thus nothing for Apple to fix, as they can’t fix your iPhone without seeing it. Have you contacted Apple support?

If it was something Apple could fix you would see thousands of posts about the issue, and Apple would realize they had to fix it. Or if thousands of users submitted feedback about the problem likewise. Have you submitted feedback: feedback.apple.com

It is something you have installed or are doing: since you mentioned streaming while using instagram that is most likely the cause. iPhone’s are not designed to stream from multiple sources at a time.

Are you using the iPhone Music app, or a 3rd party music source?

This needs to be fixed.

Ok, then let Apple know

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