Why aren't mobile browsers supported?

[elGatoMantocko]

I would love to allow my users to use my app on mobile devices as well, and was wondering why Chrome for android (at least) isn't supported. I don't have any knowledge or experience working with browser SDKs, so I couldn't possibly understand the complexity, but I would love to know if there is any future roadmap to add support.

Thanks,

Elliott

[bih]

Hey @elGatoMantocko,

Thanks for reaching out! The Web Playback SDK relies on both Encrypted Media Extensions (EME) and/or Widevine which we use as DRM for Spotify content in the SDK.

For Safari, it's because both Desktop and iOS only support an AAC-version of EME which we don't currently have support for. It's unclear when we'll do that.

For Android-based devices, they do support both EME and Widevine but require a user interaction which we have not yet added support for in the SDK. We plan on adding support for that soon!

Hope this helps! :)

[elGatoMantocko]

Awesome! Thanks so much for the reply!

[NeoLegends]

Hey @bih,

I was skimming through other issues and over in #8 you said you are streaming 256kb/s AAC music and here you said you do not support Safari because it only supports AAC-EME, which you do not support right now.

Could you clarify that? Based on what you told it seems like Safari should be supported, no? :) Or is it just one specific version of AAC-EME Safari supports but you don't? (not wanting to blame you in any way, I'm just curious :) )

[theiliad]

@bih Is there a timeline you could share for mobile compatibility?

Playing Spotify right out of the browser on computers is cool, but a very high percentage of users browse sites on their phones.

[ErezHorev]

I would really like to use your service but i have no playback at all (nor my friends at office).
This issue seems to be very common here.

Why isn't that being shown with a friendly message with instructions on how to solve?
I have no idea how to solve it. what should be installed? from where?

The links on @bih response seems for experts, no way i'm going to spend more than a minute on this.
you guys should get this covered if want users to stay your users rather than another service

Thanks

I'm using macbook OSx 10.13.3 with chrome

[arirawr]

Hi @ErezHorev - please open a new issue on this repository with specific steps we can follow to reproduce the issue you're having, and include any error messages you see. That way we'll be able to help you out 😄

[arirawr]

It looks like you received some help from the Festify developers on the issue you referenced :)

[JanneHarju]

I noticed recently that browser did ask permission automatically for something when using mobile. All works well when using Chrome for Android.

[paulgoetze]

It been a year since this issue was opened and it looks like I can still not use the SDK in mobile browsers (Android 8.1 + 9.0 on mobile firefox 64.0.2 and Chrome 69.0.3497.100). I was asked for some access permission once in Chrome, but it did not help to play music in the end.

@bih Is the support for mobile browsers planned anytime soon? Last year you said your team is going to work on this soonish – do you have any update regarding this? Thinking of Progressive Web Apps it would be such an amazing thing to have the SDK working in mobile browsers on Android at least!

[cashmash]

+1 for mobile support/update

[JanneHarju]

I think problem is not with spotify sdk problem is with mobile browsers. Spotify sdk is using feature what is not supported in mobile browsers yet. It is called Encrypted Media Extensions. You can read more it from here https://developer.spotify.com/documentation/web-playback-sdk/#supported-browsers
And here https://developers.google.com/web/fundamentals/media/eme

[JanneHarju]

Sorry I was wrong https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Encrypted_Media_Extensions_API

[tobika]

Just for info, I'm using the sdk successfully in cordova under android (which is basically a chrome webview) as well as the chrome browser under android. (unfortunately no mobile safari though)
Tested on android versions 5 till 9