Audio playback stuttering/skipping iOS11.4

I have plug in Apple ear buds. It skips without earbuds on Bluetooth Sync, with ear buds, when charging on a lightning cable, when not charging, when motionless on my desk, when driving in my car, when fully charge, when half charged. This sounds like a Dr. Seuss book.

I think it’s safe to say that most iPhone versions from the 6 to the 10 are having the same problem and it’s not the phone, it’s a bad bug in the operating system that Apple needs to fix.

I have tried a full system restore (iOS 11.4.1) and it had no effect on the skipping.

Also I tried other audio apps and so far iHeart Radio, Pandora, Audible, and Amazon Music all have the same issue as Apple Music.

I did notice it seems to happen more often when the phone is locked, so leaving my phone unlocked and just face down on my desk while at work has seemed to help somewhat, but it is quite annoying when listening to audiobooks.

Would love for Apple to get this resolved, it's crazy that a company as audio heavy as Apple would let this go on for this long.

I’ll recommend what others have:

1) submit to Apple Customer Support. Go in, show them the device, invite them to listen to 10 min of audio on their own headphones (while holding the phone inverted — after much experimentation, I think this has to do with the accelerometer). Do whatever it takes to put it on the “bug” list.

Count me in as someone who has confirmed this is an iOS bug since version ~11.3. I’m a developer as well, and I suspected certain apps were to blame until I started hearing this stuttering bug in multiple apps. It’s definitely an iOS issue. As a music lover and longtime Apple user, this is super disappointing and has me considering switching platforms as well. Audio is one thing that Apple used to nail but this is a Bad Look. Get it together guys. If it’s an issue with new features polling resources too often, or later versions of iOS needing more resources than some phones can handle... then you either need to fix that or restrict the updates to certain hardware. Please get your house in order!

kellyseattle wrote:

I believe the accelerometer then kicks in, the cpu goes to 100%, and the audio stops for 10 or 15 seconds then stutters, skips, and warbles because IOS is confused.

There is definitely a spike in CPU usage, but I think it's unrelated to the accelerometer. Have a look at this:

This was the CPU usage on my phone while audio was playing starting when it was removed from power (connected to computer, charging through USB) with the "pause" in audio, and the 30 or so seconds elapsed until the audio kicked back in.

CPU reached around 55% when the pause occurred, and a whopping 75% around the time it kicked back in.

I had about 6 or 7 apps open at the time as well, in addition to holding the phone vertically and inverted (to simulate being in a pocket... even bounced it up and down a little). While connected to power and screen display active, this didn't reach much past 25% of CPU usage. While disconnected the first time (same movements), the CPU spikes occur until the OS seemingly "corrects" itself.

(also noticed a slight dip in RAM usage around the time audio started playing again... see blue line above)

I listened to an Audible book for a 1600 mile round trip last week (I highly recommend Outlander. Between Little Rock and my destination in Kentucky, I don’t think they paused for air. What an interesting drive that was 😳), and listened to music yesterday at work. Not a single blip since iOS 12.

I’ve probably just jinxed myself!

Get a Genius Bar appointment. They know what the problem is, they just can't fix it. Ask them to replace the phone at no charge. That works for most people, but none of us can figure out why. Some of this is still a mystery.

This issue has nothing to do with a headphone jack or screen time. The issue has been consistent with my last 3 phones that don’t even have a headphone jack (7+, 8+, X) it has been around since 11.3 which was well before the introduction of screen time.

My wife’s iPhone 7 and my iPad Air 2 connect to my Bluetooth wireless speakers and my Lexus RX350 with no interference whatsoever but as soon as I connect my iPhone and play music it sounds like a skipping CD it’s infuriating. I have even tried restoring as a new phone and it still does the same thing. My last hope is that when iOS 12.3 comes out I will restore from iTunes and if that doesn’t work I’m taking it to the Apple store for a replacement as I am still under Apple Care.

Everyone here who has tried restoring to factory settings and setting up as new should make an appointment with the nearest Apple store genius bar for an evaluation. They can perform a diagnostics.

Does it happen with the earpods, with a wifi speaker, through airplay, or wireless headphones?

I factory reset and restored my 6s+ because it was happening every time I listened to music. It’s definitely a lot better but it still does it occasionally. Definitely a software issue.

It's Friday, and my iPhone 6s has been updated to iOS12 since Monday. No audio issues! I am a happy camper, for now.

🙂

I know the feeling — if this really is a case of 11.3 adding so many features the iPhone 6s can't cope with the overhead of all the extra background CPU usage, they shouldn't have released it. Prior to 11.3, I had only considered upgrading to get some of the newer features, because my phone was still working great. Now, I'm so frustrated I don't want to upgrade unless this problem actually gets fixed, *and* I'm reluctant to install updates until then, since it could make things worse.

My hope is that Apple will fix this bug in 11.4.1 or something very soon. My suspicion is there's some runaway processes since the phone also seems to get hot, but I have no idea what that would be, since like you said it happens often when the phone is otherwise idle, and just playing back audio. It'd be one thing if it skipped when I was heavily multi-tasking, but the fact that it's acting like winamp on a 486 while idle makes me think this is 100% a bug, and not just the phone being over-taxed and being unable to keep up with demand.

Frustrating, since even phone calls are affected. Maybe one of these days Apple will develop a real-time OS kernel for their mobile architectures, so we can prioritize CPU usage. Seems like this kind of bug shouldn't be possible in a well-designed application framework.

Okay, I skimmed through this thread and I mostly see "me too" and "I am switching to Android" replies. 1. Go to Android and stop threatening to do so. No one here cares what device you use. We are volunteers who answer legitimate technical questions. 2. Force restart your devices. 3. It is possible that it is not an apple issue but a Spotify/Pandora/other streaming service issue. 4. If a force restart does not work you will need to make a full backup and then restore to factory settings and set up as new. Do not restore from the backup. 5. I am running the latest software on an iPhone X with no issues at all. 6. If you are having a different issue, create your own thread and stop trying to ride on someone else's.

Add me to the +1’s.

I upgraded my 6s from 10.x to 11.4 and now I’m occasionally getting the skipping/stuttering in the native music app. Sometimes pausing and restarting the song fixes it. Other times I have to exit music and restart it to get it to go away.