Podcast plays in reverse order

[griever1988]

Plan

Free

Country

Germany

Device

PC

Operating System

Windows 10

My Question or Issue

There are already a lot of threads about this. But this bug is still not fixed yet. 

Podcasts always play in reverse order. (new to old)

But i want to hear them from old to new.

I can change the display order. I can also filter out the episodes i already heard. But this doesn't change anything. It still plays in reverse order, and also filtered episodes.

I already reinstalled Spotify twice. It didn't help. 

Please fix this.

[ZennyNazionale]

I'm affected by this too. I can either reverse the order of the playlist (which means scrolling through some 1000s of episodes just to get to the newest) or this ungodly mess we have now. like come on this is such a basic thing, the damn titles even have a date in their titles. how is it logical to have the episode of the 13th playing after i completed the one of the 14th of the same month? Come on... Due to this and the price hike I'm wondering if it may be time to unsubscribe after a decade.

[Yordan]

Hey folks,

Jumping in here with some clarifications regarding the playback of podcast episodes and their respective order on the desktop/mobile apps.

When viewing a podcast page, the episodes are sorted in the default order chosen by the creator (usually in 'Newest', but there may be some exceptions). With 'Newest', the latest episodes will appear on top. You can reverse the order so that the list starts with the oldest ones instead by switching to "Oldest". The option is located underneath the podcast's title.

When playing episodes from a podcast page, the playback will always follow the oldest-to-newest order, regardless of which sort option you've selected. Let's say you're sorting by 'Newest': if you play the second episode from the list, the next one would actually be the one above (i.e. the first one), instead of the one below. 

  

Here are some methods/tips on how to play individual episodes without adding the rest to the queue which you may find useful, feel free to check them out if you're interested:

Spoiler

Desktop

You can play a single episode (and have the playback stop when it ends) by clicking on the episode's title and playing it from there. Doing so should add only that particular episode to the queue, however, if you had leftover items manually queued from a previous listening session, you might need to clear it via the "Clear queue" button. Also, make sure Autoplay is toggled off in the app's settings.

Mobile

Unlike desktop, if you open an individual episode on mobile and play it from there, you'll get recommended content added to the queue. Here are a couple of alternatives to try if you want to play a single episode and have the playback pause afterwards:

• disable Autoplay;
• clear the rest of the queue manually;
• add the episode to a new playlist and play it from there.

We're always looking for opportunities to enhance the user experience for everyone though, so we’ll continue to innovate and test in order to find the right balance for our listeners. Your feedback on the matter is greatly appreciated, thanks for sharing it here.

Hope this clears things up. The Community is just a post away if there's anything else you need assistance with.

[Omnijuno55]

Hey Yordan. Just jumping in here to say we're all pretty much in agreement that you have no idea what you're talking about. And maybe I don't speak for everybody in the thread, but if you'd read any of the comments above, we're all apparently experiencing an issue where you click on one episode in a podcast playlist, and instead of playing the Next one, as you described, it begins queuing in a REVERSE order, as everybody here has already explained. Thanks for the attempt, hope this clears things up. 

[GerryADS]

Hi Yordan, I concur with Omnijuno55 above, this is an issue that has existed for nearly 10 years, and something I reported about a year ago, and it is still falling on deaf ears!

[Parax]

Hi Yordan,

Take a look at the order of these two podcasts (Click them) 

Show 1 (oldest first): https://open.spotify.com/show/7Hp5QDk9PsWyEXtcsDz34a

Show 2 (newest first): https://open.spotify.com/show/4pqW0HTIeZcx7vqHpwzmZj

The built-in app in my car shows the podcasts in this same order, to play the latest ep of Show1 I have to click through many pages. it sucks.

[Eni]

Hey folks, 

Thanks for all the info you've sent so far. 

In order for us to take a closer look at the behavior you described, would you mind sending us a short screen recording where we can see all the steps you take to sort the episodes and how it then populates in reverse order? You can attach it to your next response by using the Insert Video option in the post editor. You can also upload it to Google Drive and share the link with us (make sure the video has the permissions for anyone to see it).

On another note, since many of you mentioned this was happening in the car, just to confirm, is it only occurring there? If so, could you let us know if there are any sorting options in your car, or if the sorting settings transfer over from your other devices?

We'll be waiting for your replies.

[Parax]

Here you go Eni.

You should see the first show is in Oldest first (episode 001 from 30th Nov 2019) and the second is in Newest first (episode from Sunday 23rd Nov 2025). This is built in to the show somehow, and can't be changed in web or some other apps (eg in my car)..

On the First Show You can see I click through [Load More Episodes] 5 or 6 times and only get to 2022 takes forever to get to this weeks show... (I skipped the scrolling).. the Second show opens on this weeks episode. 

The app that is built in to my car also has the shows in this order and works the same way selecting the most recent show on the first example is nearly impossible while driving. the second show opens the recent episode.

These are the links that were used to open the shows: (they auto default to the first or last episode)

open . spotify . com /show/7Hp5QDk9PsWyEXtcsDz34a

open . spotify . com /show/4pqW0HTIeZcx7vqHpwzmZj

[Parax]

Eni, Here is a demo from my car.

The first show I select is NEWEST first. But the second show opens OLDEST first, exactly the same example as in the web browser linked above. I have to scroll through a hundred episodes to get to the most recent.

[Ivelina]

Hey @Parax,

Thanks a lot for providing us with these videos and links to the podcasts.

We had a look and we'd like to point out that currently, it's unfortunately not possible to sort podcast episodes on the podcast's main page on the web player and on some other devices like in your case - within the car app. We're always looking for ways to improve and offer better functions to our users and there's actually other users that would like these sorting options to be available in the web player. With this said, you can check out and add your vote to this existing Idea in order to show your support.

We previously stated that when viewing a podcast page, the episodes should be sorted by "Newest" by default, however, this also depends on the podcast creators who have the ability to choose how their episodes are displayed for users. This would explain why the podcast "A Problem Squared" displays the oldest episodes first on the main page.

There's something else worth mentioning. As a workaround you can use the Connect feature. On a mobile device, go to the podcast's main page, sort the episodes from Newest to Oldest, play an episode on the phone and then choose the web player or the app in your car to continue streaming the playback there. We know that this might not be ideal for you, but for the time being you can give it a try if you've not already done so.

We hope this info helped clear things up and don't hesitate to let us know if you've got any other questions.

Take care!

[shmightworks]

ok, while we have someone from spotify looking here, I want to emphasis that the issue isn't simply sorting the podcast order on the podcast page, it's sorting of the podcast on queue.

I can resume a podcast from where I left off, sorted from old to new, I can see it on my queue with my current episode playing and newer episodes queued up.

Problem is after some time, that queue gets lost, and I'm not sure what triggers this.  I've tried force closing the app, but that wasn't it.

So what happens is that when I finish that current episode, an older already listened episode starts playing.

Then I'd have to go back to the podcast home page and specify the correct next episode.

This is using the spotify app on android, and playing from my car (which is just bluetooth connection, I'd imagine the same could happen with bluetooth headsets).

[Omnijuno55]

Ivelina, also completely missing the point. It's not a "feature to request on an Ideas page." It's the program legitimately being nonfunctional. The issue is sporadic and random. Device doesn't matter, medium doesn't matter, it carries from car to headphones to just the phone itself, and it's been an issue on every phone I, my wife, and my kids have used in the last 10 years. This isn't getting fixed because you people keep maliciously misinterpreting and diagnosing it so you can mark it "fixed." Thank you again, hope this continues to shed light on the situation. 

[snlzkn]

Thanks, I confirm that the issue isn't related to different podcast
creators using different settings or sorting options available. This is a
bug that happens randomly. When I start a new podcast about a book , I
start from the first chapter (oldest) then I keep on listening on that
podcast for days. One morning I wake up and when the current episode I
resumed ends instead of playing the next one it plays the one before. I use
Android and Bluetooth headphones, I do not own a car.
Please note that sometimes I start Spotify from the headphone shortcut and
sometimes I open the app and press play. I can not say it only happens when
I trigger from the head phone, as I said it happens randomly

[Ivelina]

Hey folks,

Thank you for posting and sharing your details of this behavior with us. 

It's possible that what you're experiencing with the playback in reverse order is happening to other users as well where we're investigating. However, for clarification we'd first like to gather some more info. 

Let us know:

• Is this happening exclusively with podcasts, or with songs as well? Is it happening when listening to both?
• Have you enabled Smart Shuffle when this behavior occurs?

We'll be on the lookout and remain here if anything else comes up in the meantime.

@snlzkn @Omnijuno55 @shmightworks 

[shmightworks]

I have not experienced this with songs, just podcast, but I rarely ever need to listen to songs in order, so I wouldn't know if it did happen.

Smart shuffle is enabled if you're talking about "Include Smart Shuffle in play modes" in the settings.  However I don't think there's a shuffle option for podcast.

[Omnijuno55]

I'd like to concur, verbatim, with @shmightworks.

[uali23]

I have this issue with songs. I don’t listen to podcasts and this is
without shuffle or smart shuffle on. I’ve enabled shuffle to kinda ignore
the issue

[ZennyNazionale]

This is not my experience at all. It will mostly play from oldest to newest but very very often it will play an older one instead. This happens both on desktop and pc. Sometimes it will even just go to a random episode where i haven't fully listened to the episode (mostly the last 30 seconds to 1 minute). This at least to me is never an expected behavior.

[Joan]

Hi there folks,

Thanks for all the replies and your continued cooperation.

There appear to be a few different issues being mentioned here, so we want to try and narrow down the exact behaviour so that we can properly investigate this. To that end, could you please provide us the following:

• Is this on all devices or only on specific one(s)?
• The exact makes, models and OS/Firmware versions of all your affected devices
• The exact Spotify Versions you use.
• Does it happen over Bluetooth and/or Connect?
• Do you clear the queue before this happens? Alternatively, if you manually clear the queue and then start playing, does the issue occur then?
• Send us some screenshots of what the queue looks like before the issue occurs. This is to see if the unwanted items were already queued, or if the queue gets reset/modified somehow afterwards.
• If you get the opportunity, make a video of the behaviour. This will greatly aid us in getting to the bottom of things. If the files are too large to attach here in the Community, you can send them to us via Google Drive or as unlisted YouTube videos.

With this information, we’d be happy to investigate.
 

@uali23 your issue seems to be something entirely different from the ones being discussed here. Please reach out to us on a separate thread and we'll be happy to assist you further 🙂

Keep us posted.

[ZennyNazionale]

Hi Joan

• Is this on all devices or only on specific one(s)? -> I mainly listen to Podcasts on an android device, will check on windows and report back.
• The exact makes, models and OS/Firmware versions of all your affected devices -> Samsung Galaxy S22, S21 and S25. OS and Firmware versions do not seem to play a role, issue persists since a couple of years (went from 14 to the latest in that time frame)
• The exact Spotify Versions you use. Latest version, updated daily
• Does it happen over Bluetooth and/or Connect? -> Bluetooth, will try other ways
• Do you clear the queue before this happens? Alternatively, if you manually clear the queue and then start playing, does the issue occur then? -> I do not clear the queues manually. (Clarification i usually just look up the podcast and play it without using any other queuing system, then i keep using the playlist which got saved)
• Send us some screenshots of what the queue looks like before the issue occurs. This is to see if the unwanted items were already queued, or if the queue gets reset/modified somehow afterwards 

This screenshot was made just a few minutes ago. It just happened again. I was playing the episode of the 1st of december yesterday and finished to do so this morning. Then the episode of the 2nd of December played. Once that episode finished it went back to the 1st December for some reason. It seems to be completely random. If i go back to the episode of the 2nd and let it play til the end it will go to the next episode like it should. Maybe if i can provide a log i'd be happy to do so.

• If you get the opportunity, make a video of the behaviour. This will greatly aid us in getting to the bottom of things. If the files are too large to attach here in the Community, you can send them to us via Google Drive or as unlisted YouTube videos.

I will try to replicate the issue and record it but it doesn't happen all the time, may be difficult.