HomePod 2nd Gen randomly plays Apple Music at night

Yep, exact same issue here. Pair of 2nd generation HomePods and AppleTV, recently started blaring out music, unprompted, in the middle of the night when we were asleep - it's terrifying, so have had to unplug them.

I've worked through the various troubleshooting steps and workarounds, and concluded - backed up by a quick google - that the 2nd generation HomePods seem to have a quality issue with failing touch panels. (Out of interest: does the touch panel on yours still respond to touch normally? Ours don't, not since this issue occurred).

Mine are 2 years old now so Apple Support have told me they're out of warranty, so they can't offer any help (these HomePods just have to be thrown in the bin now and I have to buy new ones). Yes, that's the same Apple that talks a lot about designing "products that last".

If yours is still in warranty I'd recommend you have Apple replace them, but if you do find an alternative solution please update us - I'd be very grateful!

So far it looks like you have implemented the changes I would have suggested you try. Disabling all my automations seems to be working for mine. What I also did but have no idea if it’s of any use is to check in home app home settings- hubs and bridges to see what it’s using as a Hub. Mine had been changed to a flaky OG HomePod I most certainly never chose as my preferred hub. I switched it to my bedroom Apple TV.

I do suspect it’s somehow related to HomeKit and possibly using them as default audio.

see if what you did works over the next few days

In the meantime the only way to let Apple know on the hopes they fix it for the next software Update

is here——>Feedback - HomePod - Apple

I accidentally left ours plugged in last night and we were woken again by random unprompted music blaring from them at 4am.

Split half troubleshooting (to eliminate eg automations or hub or default audio as cause, not to mention only one of our pair has unresponsive touch panel) indicates this is just a product that can fail prematurely.

Most likely cause seems to be the touch sensor panel used, which degrade over time (though for me the problem started the same day as the 26.5 update, which could be coincidence, but…).

I’d love to know if anyone has a 2nd generation HomePod that’s 3 years or more old and is still functioning fine, without touch or random music issues

That is, do all of them suffer these issues eventually, or is it just a batch of them?

Mine are not responding to touch like they did. I’m considering a factory reset as a last resort. Right now though I have no music automations to wake me up in the am because I disabled them all, which seems to help in stopping them coming on unprompted.

zero automations on mine, set as s stereo pair connected to my apple TV in the living room. started this morning out of the blue. disabled everything but there pods completely and reset multiple times... keeps doing it. I never use the touch panel so not sure how it goes bad not being used. I used them strictly for sound from the Apple TV to replace the complicated home theater system that my wife hated. They have been gong off all day periodically while I am working upstairs in my home office. The volume is on full every time, regardless of what I set the volume to.

[Edited by Moderator]

some site made a guide of things one can try

https://forums.appleinsider.com/discussion/244490

Any music-related automations configured in the Home app?