Play button (media buttons) behavior has changed for the worse.

Ahoy ... I came here for the same situation. This has becoming ridiculous, it controls everything except iTunes, it has becoming a terrible mess, at least give us an option to opt-out of using this controls out of itunes.

It doesn't make any sense, specially when I have multiple windows open ... Mac OS doesn't know what to control at all anymore. It was really simple, press play ... open iTunes and start music. My iTunes is always on the background playing music while I work, doesn't make any sense I have to go to the iTunes window, click the window to select so the keyboard control buttons to function on iTunes?

Where is the old maximum K.I.S.S. - Keep It Simple S... ?

And even when having multiple explorer pages open Mac Os doesn't know what to pause/play anymore.

I don't want the media play button to control the video in the browser that is in focus already. I want it to control iTunes (or Spotify or whatever music player you're using) that is playing in the background.

Yep. Very annoying. Having media shortcut keys is pointless if I can only control the foreground app with them. At that point I may as well just click the play/pause button with my mouse.

Ahh. I misunderstood what you were trying to fix. I’ll try it in a few minutes and report back. Thanks for the help!

Fantastic, thank you!!

Thank you sooo much!!

Thanks Deep Sky Diver!!! My buttons didn't work after the upgrade, but now all is good 🙂 (and yes, even the play button starts iTunes again automatically in the background)

You might think they are working right but they aren’t. Try this real quick...

Start playing music on iTunes.

Go to YouTube and play any video.

Press your pause button on the keyboard.

Same - Deep Sky Diver solution works.

I have a *brand new 27" iMac* running High Sierra. The fact that I had to scrum around here for a solution is...not a good sign for Apple's software quality.

this works initially... but having cycled through a reboot, the new, unwanted behavior is restored. (ugh)

this to me a serious case of not understanding your users' behaviors.

Agree. Very anoying. Safe mode did not help.

Well, that worked for me. Thanks a bunch! 🙂 😎

This worked like a boss, thanks!

I tried it. And it DIDN'T work, as expected. It still pauses YouTube instead of iTunes, for example.

God bless you, Deep Sky Diver! And shame on you, Apple! First they took our ports, then media buttons... BUT THEY WILL NOT TAKE OUR FREEDOM!