Spotify has shelved plans to add AirPlay 2 support to its iOS app for the time being. “We’ve discussed this Idea internally and while we are working on supporting AirPlay2 in a proper way, we have decided to close it for now,” a Spotify representative wrote on the community forums, as reported by MacRumors.
The company has pinned the blame on audio driver compatibility issues. Because of those, “this seems like a bigger project that we won’t be able to complete in the foreseeable future.”
Apple rolled out AirPlay 2 three years ago as part of iOS 11.4. The company also enabled support for third-party music services on HomePod and HomePod mini last year. In 2019, Spotify filed a complaint with the European Commission that accused Apple of locking it and other companies Apple competes with out of the likes of Siri, HomePod, and Apple Watch. Spotify still doesn’t offer native support for HomePod speakers, though you can play music from the app through Siri and download Spotify tracks on Apple Watch.
You can still connect Spotify to speakers and smart TVs over AirPlay or Spotify Connect. Spotify users won’t officially be able to harness AirPlay 2 capabilities like reduced latency, multi-room audio and Siri control anytime soon. However, because AirPlay is fully integrated with iOS, it should still work with any audio app as long as you use the OS-level playback controls, rather than the Spotify app.
