Samsung Galaxy Watch: Unable to skip songs

[davidhoover5]

Same issue here... S23 Ultra and Galaxy Watch Ultra. Worked fine on Galaxy Watch 5 Pro which I traded in for the Watch Ultra. I should have waited, skipping or replaying is definitely a feature I used a lot from my watch while listening to Pandora on my phone. 

[Storieddeth]

Not a fix. Following the steps does not resolve the issue. 

Adam's steps do not work

Moderator Edit: Merged posts

[TannerPandora]

Hi @Storieddeth 

Welcome to community! Sorry to hear those steps didn't help to improve your experience. I've passed along your info to our engineering team for investigation.

We appreciate your patience in the meantime.

[tortcat]

Just to reiterate, most of us with Galaxy watches are NOT using any pandora app on the watch, but rather simply the built in Galaxy watch media controller. This controller works fine on literally every other media app I have tested, EXCEPT Pandora.   Now when playing the Pandora app on the Samsung phone, the forward and backwards buttons on the "watch" are greyed out. The steps of clearing cache etc etc   does not work.  For some reason the Galaxy watch media controller suddenly cannot access the forward and backwards buttons ..the music plays...you cna adjust the volume but those buttons are greyed out.  This only happening with Pandora, spotify no problem, itunes, no problem, playing  various other media apps etc on the samsung phone, no problem. The forward and backwards buttons work on the galaxy watch.  The moment you switch to the Pandora app on the galaxy phone..the fwd and backwards buttons on the media controller of the galaxy watch are "greyed out".

[dustm17]

Same issue, wiped the watch, reset Pandora app cache, reinstalled app, reinstalled watch OS. Still not fix. I'm debating just canceling Pandora premium. Had similar issues with other Bluetooth devices.

[AdamPandora]

We apologize for the continued trouble, @dustm17.

Your feedback has now been passed along to our engineering team as well.

We appreciate your patience in the meantime. 

[Peventura1]

Same as everyone else on here. Updated phone (s23 ultra to s25 ultra) and watch (galaxy 5 to Galaxy Ultra) and the forward and back button on the watch media player doesn't work. If this simple issue doesn't get fixed, probably will go to Spotify. The annoyance of taking out my phone to change the song while walking is next level.

[AdamPandora]

@Peventura1 I definitely understand your frustration.

Your feedback has been noted and passed along to our engineering team.

We apologize for any inconvenience around this

[Nics247]

Samsung s25 Ultra, and Galaxy watch Ultra. This solution did not work. But did require a lot of setup on my end because unpairing the watch resets it to factory settings, had to restore the backup. 

• Model: Galaxy S25 Ultra SM-S938U1/Galaxy Watch Ultra SM-L705U
• Carrier: T-Mobile
• Android version: One UI V 7.0, Android V 15
• Build number: I don't see "Build Number" in about phone settings
• Android Security Patch Level: 12-1-2024
• Pandora version:
  • 2411.1.3 

Are you connected to Wi-Fi or cellular data when this is happening? Yes, and in offline mode too

Have you identified any other patterns or notable information? Updated everything, cleared cache, uninstalled and reinstalled everything, unpaired and repaired. only pattern is forward and back buttons do not work on watch at anytime in any configuration

[Rikfleming212]

I went to Spotify and have never been happier. Complete synchronization between watch, phone, ear buds and PC. It's a pain to recreate the play lists, but worth it in the end

[Nics247]

Might be the best solution

[dollyparton]

this "solution" didn't work. just caused another gigantic CLUSTERFORK of a situation for me, my watch, and app. so glad I lost my searches 🫠

fun question ..... do the developers even have a galaxy watch to perform QA testing when providing solutions....?

---

did it work for anyone else?

[sonarman]

I was able to use Google Assistant as a work-around for my Galaxy Watch Ultra connected to my Galaxy S20+ 5G phone.  I don't use voice activation (i.e. "hey google") to activate Google Assistant on the watch. Instead, I set the watch to long press the home button to activate Google Assistant.  But I think it would work fine if you prefer to use "hey google" to activate Google Assistant.  I am able to activate Google Assistant then tell the watch to "play the next song" or to "repeat the last song" while streaming Pandora through the watch and it actually works!

Crazy that Google Assistant can provide this functionality but the native music controller app won't allow it.

[LiveLearnLeave]

THIS SOLUTION DOES NOT WORK - if you try it, you will waste your time and have to set your watch back up with all your preferences and settings for no reason.

This is not a solution.  I just spent the past hour doing as you suggested, unpair my watch, clearing the Pandora app cache and data and then resetting my watch (cuz that's what you have to do when you unpair it from your phone and try to re-pair it).  It did not work.  I just wasted an hour of time, and now have to set my watch back up to the way I prefer it.  I am the account holder for a Premium Family plan, so now I'm also stuck downloading all the offline music I wanted again.

4 of the 5 users on my Premium Family plan have Samsung phones and watches.  The skip forward/backward buttons are only disabled when using Pandora, not any other music subscription services when using the media player on the watch.  If we cannot control the Pandora app on our phone through our watches, this service becomes useless to us, and as many others here have stated - I will be considering canceling my subscription since it is not providing the service it should be able to.

Please re-evaluate your "solution" as it is incorrect and unhelpful.

[Sportster64]

My guess is your developer has not even begun work on this issue based on the lame solution you have provided

What is the work ticket number assigned to the developer  ?

I'm getting real frustrated that Pandora has not escalated this to a developer 

[dollyparton]

update:

OKAY SO, it stopped working so I went back to troubleshoot and retrace my app-running-steps.

turns out it was only working thru my Waze app (even though it had been closed)

so here's what happened in detail:

• open Waze app
• open Pandora through Waze app
• close Waze app
• Watch control works for Pandora via Waze app thru some weird configuration, even after closing the Waze app. However, I believe if you 'force close' either if the apps, that will most likely end the connection.

THIS BY ALL MEANS IS NOT A FIX. ITS A WORK AROUND. PANDORA STILL NEEDS TO DO BETTER.

thanks for coming to my tedtalk 🙂

-----

YALL ITS WORKING. IDK HOW IDK WHY. BUT RN ITS WORKING 

 

[Droidasaur5]

Same issue here. For the record, I am still using the same devices as before the Skip-Forward & Back buttons were disabled... one day back in (around) December '24 they just stopped working. 

   At that time, I had been a free account user for many years (perhaps 20), and since I was already tired of the commercials and the time limits on Premium Sessions, I decided to go ahead with upgrading to Premium service. I was HOPING that this upgrade would restore functionality to these now useless buttons... but to no avail, it did not. 

   This disappointed prompted me to start looking into the Pandora Community posts on the subject... only to find that not only was a "solution" posted, but quite a few people have already tried and denounced this as NOT a solution at all. Not only does it not work but people had wasted a lot of time trying it and then having to rebuild their downloaded content for offline use. To that I say thanks but no thanks. (In other words ADAM, I'm not even going to try this pointless exercise.) 

   Other than that, I have been pretty happy with the upgrade. While others are threatening to leave Pandora over this one issue, I will give them time to work out an actual solution. To date, Pandora has amassed a lot of data on my listening habits and the thought of throwing it all away to start again with another service seems a bit rash. 

   In closing, I am a patient man but I have my limits. And since I know that Pandora will ask, I'm including the following information...

Phone:

• Model: Samsung S10e 

• Model number: SM-G970U

• Carrier: T-Mobile 

• Android version: 12

• Build number: SP1A.210812.016.G970USQU91XE3

• Android Security Patch Level: 03/1/23 (Yes, this is the latest update for this phone) 

• Pandora version: 2501.1

Connected to both Wi-Fi and cellular data at different times with same results. 

● Watch: Samsung Galaxy Watch 6

Happy debugging 

-Bill

[Vguzman]

Pandora is there a fix yet? If not 6 of us will have to unsubscribe from your service.

[Rdstngry]

I've been having the same issue for quite some time time now. I don't remember when it started, but I believe it was after an update from Samsung. Either on the watch or on the phone. Possibly both within days of each other. 

Pandora Version 2501.1

S21 ultra and Galaxy Watch 5

Watch Software Info:

One Ul version

6.0 Watch

Software version

R925USQU1CXK2

Google Play services

25.08.32 (240300-731361394)

System version

14

Wear OS version

5.0

Wear core services

1.22.59.706713850

Security software version

ASKS v7.8 Release 20240926

Android security patch level

October 1, 2024

Phone Software Info:

One Ul version

 6.1

Android version 

14

Google Play system update

February 1, 2025

Baseband version

G998U1UESEGYA5

Kernel version

5.4.254-qgki-28582291-abG998U1UESEGYA5

#1 Mon Jan 27 19:42:35 KST 2025

Build number

UP1A.231005.007.G998U1UESEGYA5

SE for Android status

Enforcing

SEPF SM-G998U1_12_0001

Mon Jan 27 19:44:24 2025

Knox version

Knox 3.10

Knox API level 37

Knox ML 1.4

DualDAR 1.6.0

HDM 2.0 - 5

Service provider software version

SAOMC_SM-G998U1_OYM_VZW_14_0010

VZW/VZW,VZW/XAA

Security software version

MDF v3.3 Release 1

BT v1.0 Release 1

WLAN v1.0 Release 2

VPN Client v2.4 Release 1.0

ASKS v8.4 Release 20240926

ADP v3.1 Release 20230510

FIPS BoringSSL v1.7

FIPS SKC v2.2

FIPS SCrypto v2.5

SMR Feb-2025 Release 1

Android security patch level February 1, 2025

[Thevolget]

Still no fix on this as of 3/19. 

Funny thing is that on my old Watch 4, and Watch 3, the media controller app on the watch works flawlessly.  The media controller app on the watch also doesn't work and behaves in the same manner when paired to another phone, which I tested on a Pixel 6 running the android 14.  It behaves the same way, only with the Pandora app.  With the built in media player, Spotify, Youtube Music, and even Tidal, the watch's media controller app behaves as expected. 

This is the same behavior that is being experienced with my Samsung S25 Ultra, and had been experienced on my Samsung S22 Ultra.  The issue lies in the Pandora app having blocked / removed application hooks that the newer Galaxy Watchs (non tizen firmwares) require.