Why do all my Homepods play the same music at different times after updating to IOS18? It doesn't happen in IOS17! There are more than 5 Homepods in my place. After I started to play for a while, maybe 3-5 songs, the audio does not sync anymore! It does like the delay time is a mess with the system!
HomePod, 18
Hello good people!
After months of audio problems with HomePods and AppleTV, iPhone or AirPlay—it’s hard to say exactly which—I’ve finally found a solution. I’ve tested it for a while now, and there are NO issues regardless of the app or device. I’ve tried it with Apple Music and Spotify in AppleTV and iPhone, and it now works flawlessly. I should also mention that I’m running the iOS 18.4 Developer version on all my devices. The problems I experienced were crackling sounds or sync issuesafter a while as I tried playing on multiple HomePods in the home, usually playing on different HomePods in stereo pairs, and the speakers in the stereo pairs losing sync.
Now for the solution. In my case, it was IGMP/multicast-related. My switches had IGMP snooping enabled—as did my Asus WiFi(Mesh) routers—but they only had IGMP snooping activated on WiFi. I had to enable multicast routing on the LAN as well. On Asus devices, you can find these settings under Wireless > Professional and LAN > IPTV. Now everything works perfectly again.
Hope this helps someone find a solution.
\Dan
Hi, it’s very frustrating. I made mine into a non stereo pair and left them like that for a few days then re paired them and so far it’s been ok. I have no confidence this will last though
Same for me. TERRIBLE bug that seems to throw off the sync between homepods completely. I had to turn off lossless and dolby atmos that used to work perfectly fine on 17. Speakers are also crackling and then stops playing. Hope it doesn’t damage any hardware. Can’t believe Apple passed this update. I’m better off using a JBL bluetooth speaker. No update yet one month in :(
Yes, for us as of 18.4.1 Apple Music sync issue remains.
Our system is 1 Homepod Gen 2, 2 Homepod Mini stereo pairs, and 2 Homepod Mini singles. using Apple Music through any combination of these results in out of sync occurring within 30-60 minutes. I have worked with Apple Support and provided diagnostic data capture under their guidance several months ago. Sad so far no resolution. I can only hope... but I am beginning to think I will need to consider another music streaming service with less Siri/Homekit integration.
Yes Same here I just spent all weekend rebuilding my HomePod network after this update broke the Sync - only to find it made absolutely no difference!! OS18 definitely the culprit- was fine before - even tried turning if lossless and Atmos but no change. I can live with slow Siri- but music not playing in sync literally defeats the point of having these speakers!
I just reported the bug. I brought out my sonos speakers and created a scene just as i did with homepods and no issues. Strictly a homepod ecosystem issue. The homepods have no correction between them. With all the mics on the homepods and listening for alarms and commands it cannot detect out of sync. Silly bug
Brilliant! This was the clue that seems to have my heterogeneous HomePod system back in sync!
The fix for me, at least, was to go into the Settings for my gen1 HomePod and disable all its listening features - Siri, alarms, everything. I already have a pair of HomePods in the room, after all.
And I’m now three songs along in testing, gen 1 and gen 2 pods are in perfect synch, and I believe you are my favorite person today EmmetPratt 😄
… oops. Nope, spoke too soon. Just started doing it again ☹️
Well, back to the debugging board.
It seems like when I try to play music on my HomePods in more than one room it generates a massive level of network congestion that doesn’t exist at any other time on my network. This causes issues with all my devices not just my HomePods, but it does lead to issues controlling my HomePod music from my iPhone as well as random HomePods stopping playing the music.
I use three TP-Link Deco X25 in my place. It is mesh WiFi 6 system. The speed can go up to 1,800 Mbps. This is only Audio data. When many of my friends come to my place, they all can play 4K video smoothly. I believe the problem came from Apple Music with HomePod itself because when I tried Spotify, my HomePods work well. That’s so ironic. If it’s not for ALAC, I already stop my subscription of Apple Music.
USA, and Verizon Fios - the latest router.
I switched over to playing from my Mac, which at least stopped the sync issues. Still dealing with abrupt endings and false starts.
If these issues aren't fixed by then, I'm dropping my Apple Music subscription once the free trial ends next month. If I have to play from my Mac, and don't have the ability to control volume and speakers from any device, there is no point in paying the subscription price.
Upper right of the Music window, you should see the symbol for selecting where to play from. All external speakers should show up there. Select as many or as few as you want. Warning - the selections are very sensitive. It is far too easy to end up disconnecting all the speakers when trying to adjust the volume of one. You just have to reselect them, so a minor annoyance in the scheme of things.
More annoying is that, in the last couple of days - since the last OSX security update - the sync issues have started when playing from my Mac. Not as bad as when playing straight from Apple Music; I only have to adjust it a few times a day, rather than a few times an hour. Sigh.
Done all that multiple times. Small house, and the ones closest to the router - literally a few feet away - are just as likely to go out of sync as the ones further away. The furthest ones are maybe 30 feet away. If this is ever fixed I'll resubscribe to Apple Music. Right now, the only thing that prevents the sync issues is air playing from my Mac. Though I still get the false starts with that.
The same problem appeared in OS17.0 and fixed in 17.2. But we have same problem now again.
OG HomePod 'previewing' random songs in a… - Apple Community
Factory reset doesn't work.
Since 18.1 everything stable again. :)
I had already disabled Dolby Atmos without any improvement. I will disable Lossless and try that.
Audio sync problem with multiple HomePod after update to IOS18
