Connection on Airplay keeps dropping, suspect caused by IOS 7

Just an update. I haven't had any problems with Apple TV since I made the change. It works perfectly.

I work in Technology - and have for 8 years - and wanted to share this fix to help out: I have always loved Airplay and had no issues with streaming music, video, etc. from my Mac or iOS device. After the latest macOS Sierra update and latest tvOS update I started having this issue. I would Airplay from my Mac to Apple TV and after 30 seconds to a few minutes the Apple TV would drop the stream and the airplay icon on my mac would turn red. Frustrating, to say the least! After browsing around and looking at answers out there, I knew no one had figured it out. In my environment this is absolutely not a network issue: confirmed fact. It is due the either macOS Sierra or tvOS (and for those having the same issue from iOS, might be a bug there too), most likely (based on what I'll share below) a bug in the new tvOS. Here's the context of the fix: if you haven't noticed, at the moment you Airplay from iOS or macOS, you can then control (start, stop, forward) the music playing on the streaming device from the Apple TV remote (remote app or physical remote). This is pretty cool, yes, but also means that Apple is "messing around with" making some updates and bringing in new features with how CONTROL of airplay works. I like it, love it actually, until it gets a bug. So, odd as it may seem, I believe the bug is within the remote control element of Airplay and not the network. Here's the fix I found:

1. Airplay to your Apple TV from macOS or iOS.
2. Wait until the Apple TV inevitably drops the stream (30 seconds to 1 minute).
3. Using your remote (handheld remote device or Apple Remote app, doesn't matter) to control the Airplay stream from the Apple TV, press play/pause button to pause play of music, video, etc. Your source device (iOS or macOS) should pause the media at this point too.
4. Using the remote, press play/pause to resume the airplay music/video stream. It will start again on your source device and the Apple TV.
5. The Airplay stream will no longer drop... (This hasn't failed yet).

I haven't had one issue since figuring this out and taking these steps. If by some chance it drops, try steps 3 and 4 again, and you'll be all good (this hasn't happened to me yet, but it's a logical troubleshooting step). Hope this helps my frustrated Apple device folks (like me).

Hi Joshua,

thanks for this solution. Unfortunately it doesn't work in my environment. After step 3 and 4 (stoping and starting the stream with the remote controller) the Airplay stream drops again after 30 seconds. But I have only problems when I am using third party products with airplay. The latest iTunes version on macOS Sierra or Airplay with iOS 10 (latest version) works perfect together with ATV 4. I have also no problems when I am streaming music from any device to an ATV 3.

So I believe that Apple has changed something in the protocol of Airplay in the latest ATV4 version. Maybe the other vendors must update their software.

But you mentioned that you have also problems with iTunes and ATV4. That's bad :-(

Hi. The AirPlay protocol was revised with the release of iOS 9 in Sept. 2015. This change killed some 3rd party AirPlay receivers.

Thanks! After months of frustration and hours of browsing the internet looking for the solution, yours worked! Clearly Apple has some sort of bug with the remote control of the Apple TV. This workaround will work fine until they hopefully fix it. So glad to listen to my music uninterrupted again. 🙂

I had assumed that it was the Gen 1 ATV being faulty so I stupidly replaced it with a new 32Gb Gen 4 running 10.1.

Same s#@t different setup.

I have had music dropouts on Spotify at an annoying frequency for months from a laptop running OSX and two iPhone 5S's running iOS 10.2, and an iPhone 6 plus. This issue has persisted through at least iOS 8.x onwards, possibly older.

Spotify is rock solid on all devices on Wifi at home and even over mobile data in flakey coverage.

My WiFi shows as 5 bars on the ATV "About" page in settings and WiFi speed tests show 23+mB/s at the ATV which is more than adequate bandwidth.

Not a movie buff but the only movie I have watched on the new one didn't miss a beat.

I will try changing the ATV WiFi onto its own channel however as nothing else in my network of many devices has this issue regardless of range or location I still believe the issue remains within the Apple architecture. No matter how much I like Apple products (8 of) I still dont think they are perfect. If they were this thread would not have persisted for several years. Lets all apply logic not passion and we all might benefit from a solution

I'll post an update if anything improves

I have the same issue ATM.

ATV4, 10.1.1

iPhone 5s, iOS 9.0.2

Asus RT-AC56U router, 5GHz

Not that good at all!!! :-(

It’s definitely an iOS issue. My iPhone 5s has the update and has this issue. My iPad 4 doesn’t have the update and has no issues.