iOS 16 no audio playback in background

When I listening to a show or a song while screen is lock VLC will randomly just stop. I do have the settings enabled to play in background but doesn’t seem to work.

moved from vlc#27333 (moved)

added Needs review label

I tested on both iOS 16.0.1 and iOS 16.0 (physical & simulator devices) and was not able to reproduce this bug.

What setting are you using in VLC ? Have you tried it with headphones? Wire and wireless? I have the same issue on iPadOS. I’ve tried different kinds of format and still have the same issue.

I tested again on several devices (once again both physical and simulated devices) running on iOS 16.0, iOS 16.0.1 and iPadOS 16.0, with the "Audio playback in background" setting enabled in the Audio section of the settings and I cannot seem to reproduce this issue.

The 3.3.8 version of the application is available on the App Store, feel free to reopen this issue if you notice the same behaviour.

closed

This issue is not solved, the last time I checked this ticket was not closed but since it is closed, I am now leaving a comment.

I have had this issue for a while. Can you try playing .aac files and seeing if you have this issue (that is the format of my media). I also use headphones that are connected via bluetooth on an iphone xs.

On rare occasions, when it is stopped and I press a button on my headphones to make it resume playing, my phone will actually start up the music app and play alarm tones that I've purchased from itunes to use for the alarm clock app. It is quite jarring going from music to very loud alarm tones.

Even though I will always try and support open source (via tips), this issue is making me reconsider whether or not I should just buy a competitor's app

@diogo.simao-marques plsssss help

Thank you for your feedback!

I am reopening this issue for further testing and trying to reproduce this.

reopened

@diogo.simao-marques an addendum: I noticed that if I leave my phone unlocked, it will behave as expected (continues playing after song ends with VLC in the background). When the phone is locked and the song ends, then the playback is paused.

@diogo.simao-marques the issue somehow resolved itself. I suspect that connecting more than one bluetooth device (two+ concurrent devices) has something to do with it. I was trying to turn on an older pair of earphones and then turned off my newer pair, which then resolved the issue.

I'm not entirely sure how to reproduce this bug either, I've tried removing and pairing the bluetooth devices over again in a variety of ways but it all seems to work just as one would expect. Maybe its the upgrade from 15 to 16 specifically that causes this issue, I am not sure.

It's just really strange because not even resetting or reinstalling the app was able to fix it (I did this multiple times). For future onlookers, maybe try messing around with bluetooth by connecting two pairs of earphones or by forgetting/pairing devices again. I shouldve tested to see if background audio worked without bluetooth before it resolved itself to be sure it was a VLC issue, but it didn't occur to me at the time.

@diogo.simao-marques nvm somehow it regressed back into the same bugged behavior. I am not sure what is going on. For a brief while though, it seemed as if everything was fixed. I guess back to experimenting I go :\

e: I know for a fact, though, that this is bluetooth-related, because when I use my iphone's speaker, this issue does not occur.

I was able to reproduce the background playback issue with the .aac file format.

The live stream player is displayed, interrupting the playback at the end of the media.

Moreover, if the user wants to pause and resume the playback, the playback is completely stopped and Apple's music application starts playing the most recently added track.

I proposed a fix with !865 (merged), that should probably appear on the next release.

Thank you again for your feedback!

ok maybe it wasn't, "for a fact", bluetooth related >.>

THANK YOU SO MUCH!

mentioned in merge request !865 (merged)

This happens to me all the time. I have an iPhone 13 mini running 16.3.

1. start playing stream, example: http://www.tm-radio.com:8000/tribalmixes
2. turn screen off
3. ~30s later playback stops
4. unlock phone, open vlc app. It goes back to the main page as if it was killed
5. start stream again
6. usually playback will continue indefinitely now

vlcdebug-2023-02-02--19-15-11.log

mentioned in issue #1538 (closed)

changed milestone to %3.5.0

assigned to @fkuehne

unassigned @fkuehne

removed milestone %3.5.0

changed milestone to %4.0.0

assigned to @diogo.simao-marques

closed with commit 3c1b64dd