iPhone 17 Pro Max speaker volume fluctuates during songs

I noticed that the speakers/sound of my new iPhone 17 pro max have a problem. It might be a software issue. When I play a song, the loudness drastically decreases or increases. for example, when there are vocals in the song, the volume suddenly goes very high, and when there are no more vocals, the volume goes very low, all the instruments get very quiet. I have tried everything, different settings and cannot find a solution.

[Re-Titled by Moderator]

Original Title: My new iPhone 17 Pro Max has a speaker/sound problem. The loudness drastically changes during different sections of songs.

iPhone 17 Pro Max, iOS 26

Posted on Nov 4, 2025 9:58 AM

20 replies

Sebjau Author

Level 1

19 points

Nov 6, 2025 2:56 PM in response to Ochiboy

Thats exactly what is happening! Yes! When vocals come in, the volume and instruments go up to the normal level but when its only instrumental it just gets drastically lower and the quality also decreases!

Nov 19, 2025 7:34 PM in response to Sebjau

I am also having this problem. The songs volume fluctuates drastically on its own when it’s just the instrumental portion of a song. But when the vocals or lyrics begin the volume drastically increases. This needs to be fixed. This is a terrible bug in the phone

Ochiboy

Level 1

14 points

Nov 20, 2025 2:57 PM in response to Lawrence Finch

Did you think I'd come to a point to look for other people reporting the same issues if I haven't checked all possible iPhone settings already? Volume Limit is default disabled on my phone, Reduce Loud Sounds as well.

It's not even one of the settings on Apple Music (Sound Check), and that doesn't matter since the issue occurs outside Apple Music.

It's funny, people didn't even realize this is an issue before I brought it up to light on a reddit post. It's easy to see this issue if you're comparing it with Androids that does not have this issue at all.

I didn't even notice this issue at first until I played some music on my speakers.

Nov 20, 2025 5:45 PM in response to Ochiboy

Ochiboy wrote:

Did you think I'd come to a point to look for other people reporting the same issues if I haven't checked all possible iPhone settings already? Volume Limit is default disabled on my phone, Reduce Loud Sounds as well.

It's not even one of the settings on Apple Music (Sound Check), and that doesn't matter since the issue occurs outside Apple Music.

It's funny, people didn't even realize this is an issue before I brought it up to light on a reddit post. It's easy to see this issue if you're comparing it with Androids that does not have this issue at all.

I didn't even notice this issue at first until I played some music on my speakers.

Sorry, I am not a mind reader, so how could I possibly know what troubleshooting you did unless you told us?

Nov 22, 2025 5:43 PM in response to Sebjau

Same issue with my iPhone which by the way I have noticed just the other day. I have also tried to adjust all the setting as adviced, but nothing !

Did anyone brought their phone to the Apple Store and had the issue fixed ?

iPhone 17 Pro Max speaker volume fluctuates during songs