iPhone Bluetooth headphones: Erratic volume

[chris4565]

Hi,

I just had a very annoying and potentially even dangerous encounter regarding the volume of my Sony Bluetooth headphones. Whenever I listen to music with them I have the volume at around 50%. I took a screenshot (didn't listen to music at this moment) and then I noticed that suddenly the volume spiked to about 90%. I'm so glad I noticed this because I would have been scared as heck if I hadn't noticed it and resumed music playback. I decreased the volume and took another screenshot and it spiked again to 90%. Later I even believe that a notification that came in caused the volume to spike again. So it looks like it has something to do with system sounds.

I really hope that someone has an idea how to fix this because this bug is awful.

Thanks and best wishes
Chris

 

[Mabus51]

AirPods and Bluetooth headphones after a few minutes just get all staticky and garbled to me until they lose connection. If you try to switch headsets while on a call you lose all sound. You can’t even go back to handset for audio just dead air. I didn’t have this problem until 13.1.2 was installed.

 

[chris4565]

That doesn't sound good (no pun intended ?). Looks like audio is really buggy at the moment.

 

[Mabus51]

Yeah I’ve repaired the headsets too. Seems to only effect phone calls. Just tested music and that seems to work. Weird

 

[chris4565]

Also encountering this now on my replacement device (after I dropped my previous iPhone).

Sometimes the volume just spikes to 90% when I e. g. launch an app. I forgot about this yesterday, continued music playback and it was so loud that my ears even hurt an hour later.

Kind of ironic that a company that’s so invested into health (also even specifically hearing-related (noise-monitoring on Apple Watch, dB-monitoring)) has this issue...

I’m still gonna try re-pairing the headphones.

 

[Vlad Soare]

I also noticed a couple of times that the notification sound volume had turned up to approximately 90% on its own accord. I once received a reminder notification that was much, much louder than usual. I checked the sound volume setting and brought it back to the original level. Everything was fine for a few days, then one day I was in the office - phone lying on my desk in front of me - and received a call, and it was so awfully loud that I almost jumped out of my seat.
There must be a bug in iOS 13.2.3. But I can't replicate it. I have no idea what I did that might have triggered that.

 

[chris4565]

What a coincidence: I just noticed that the locking sound of my iPhone X was way louder than usual, then I checked the notification/ringer volume and it was at about 90% (up from the usual 50%).

This bug is really bad. Especially when the media volume jumps to 90% as it was the case yesterday.

 

[Ntombi]

I also noticed a couple of times that the notification sound volume had turned up to approximately 90% on its own accord. I once received a reminder notification that was much, much louder than usual. I checked the sound volume setting and brought it back to the original level. Everything was fine for a few days, then one day I was in the office - phone lying on my desk in front of me - and received a call, and it was so awfully loud that I almost jumped out of my seat.
There must be a bug in iOS 13.2.3. But I can't replicate it. I have no idea what I did that might have triggered that.

Are you sure it’s an iOS bug, not a Sony bug? Maybe it needs a firmware update to communicate properly with iOS 13.2.3.

I don’t have the Sonys, though, my AirPods Pro don’t have this glitch, so that’s why I’m wondering.

 

[Vlad Soare]

In my case there was no Sony involved. The phone itself started beeping/ringing much louder for no apparent reason. And when I opened the sound settings I saw that the slider had moved almost all the way to the right.
The 'Change with Buttons' option is also set to off, so the possibility that the volume buttons were somehow inadvertently pressed while the phone was in the pocket can be ruled out.

 

[chris4565]

- Regarding the media volume bug: I only have this issue with the Sonys (which are updated to the latest firmware). I never have this issue with my AirPods 2 (also never had it with the AirPods 1).

- Regarding the notification/ringer volume bug: It's the same for me as Vlad's experience.

Edit: Would be awesome if another Sony owner could share his/her experience regarding this. If this is really Sony specific I'm going to get another pair of headphones because this bug is awful.

 

[Vlad Soare]

I have the second generation AirPods, but I cannot link them to the ringer volume, because as far as I remember it didn't happen immediately before or after having used them. I use them quite rarely.
I tried to remember what it was that I had been doing prior to that moment, and the only thing I can think of is that on both occasions I had been in a meeting and had used the hardware switch to turn the silent mode on. So I suspected that maybe turning off the silent mode raises the volume to 90%. But no, doing that on purpose now doesn't seem to have any adverse effect, so it must be something else.

 

[chris4565]

I now re-paired the headphones. Result: Instead of jumping to 90% sometimes it now jumps to 50%.

I now also found a way to (for me at least) 100% reliably replicate the bug:

1.) Turn down volume to e. g. 20%
2.) Power off headphones
3.) Turn them back on --> Volume jumps to 50%
4.) Turn volume down to e. g. 20% again
5.) Go into Safari
6.) Click the address bar and... voilá, it jumps to 50% ?

But since I don't want to risk that they suddenly decide to jump back up to 90% again I'm going to get another pair of Bluetooth headphones, maybe the Bose 700.

I slowly get the impression that Sony + Apple isn't the best combination since I e. g. also can't perform a firmware update for my camera since the update process is completely bugged and even my MacBook Pro crashed then.

 

[chris4565]

Since getting the Bose 700 I never ever had this problem again. Then, today, a firmware update came out and now I have the same problem there. I can't freaking believe it It's not as replicable as with the Sonys but it's basically the same problem. I really wish I would know what's going on and if there's a fix. I will re-pair them to my iPhone but I have no hopes that this will fix it since it also didn't really fix this problem with the Sonys.

EDIT: It definitely has to do with typing (at least sometimes; maybe the typing sound?). Here is a video of the bug 2 times in a row. And the jump to 50% in the beginning of the video was also a bug.

EDIT 2: Yup, re-pairing did nothing to solve the problem.

EDIT 3: Bose support couldn't help me unfortunately. Tried it with another iPhone and there I have the same problem so it looks like it's an iOS problem. Now trying my luck with the Apple Support.

EDIT 4: Apple Support also didn't find a solution so now it's basically just wait and see if another update for the Bose or iOS comes out that fixes this problem.