Contributor I

Answered

Pandora - simultaneous streams

Forum|Forum|8 months ago
January 28, 2026
9 replies
167 views

My client has 6 Pandora accounts. In 4 different states. Occasionally, one of them played the "someone else is listening to your music" and shuts down the Pandora. Nothing else in the planet is playing that account number.

I've talked to Pandora and they are clueless. Does anyone have any ideas what's going on?

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Best answer by Airgetlam

Does your client use Sonos?

Is it possible someone is restarting the stream on one of the Sonos when your client isn’t at one location?

If a Sonos is involved, it would only show that ‘error’ when instructed by the Pandora authorization server, and not by a Sonos server. But I’d still recommend that your client submit a system diagnostic within 10 minutes of experiencing this problem, and call Sonos Support to discuss it. They, or you, shouldn’t post the resulting diagnostic number here, Sonos’ lawyers get sensitive about GDPR, I suspect.

There may be information included in the diagnostic that will help Sonos pinpoint the issue and help you find a solution.

When they, or you speak directly to the Support staff, they have tools at their disposal that will allow them to give you advice specific to your network and Sonos system.

AirgetlamAnswer

Does your client use Sonos?

Is it possible someone is restarting the stream on one of the Sonos when your client isn’t at one location?

If a Sonos is involved, it would only show that ‘error’ when instructed by the Pandora authorization server, and not by a Sonos server. But I’d still recommend that your client submit a system diagnostic within 10 minutes of experiencing this problem, and call Sonos Support to discuss it. They, or you, shouldn’t post the resulting diagnostic number here, Sonos’ lawyers get sensitive about GDPR, I suspect.

There may be information included in the diagnostic that will help Sonos pinpoint the issue and help you find a solution.

When they, or you speak directly to the Support staff, they have tools at their disposal that will allow them to give you advice specific to your network and Sonos system.

Bruce

The sound guyAuthor

Contributor I

Yes all the locations are only running ports. No one at these locations has the skill set to change anything. And occasionally this phenomenon happens.

Airgetlam

There’s no ‘change’ necessary, you just have to restart the existing ‘connection’ in a controller. Perhaps your client could try selecting a different stream to play on each Port when they leave that location, so that Pandora doesn’t think there are multiple connections.

Bruce

Airgetlam

Conversely, as your client has so many different accounts with Pandora, this FAQ may help:

The multiple accounts per service FAQ.

Bruce

The sound guyAuthor

Contributor I

Right but every single location has its own Pandora account. With different emails and different authentication protocols. So how can Sonos decide to play somebody else's account without Pandora telling it to? It's acting like it could be playing your music on there port

Airgetlam

Don’t know, offhand, this isn’t an issue I’ve ever needed to deal with. Which is why I suggested submitting diagnostics and calling in to support.

Bruce

User694694

Enthusiast II

I had this issue 4 years ago and documented it in my post above. I came back today to see if Pandora had maintained their position. I’ve been with Apple Music Family, SoundMachine and Spotify Family Premium since, but still remember the good days of Pandora Radio stations. From what I am piecing together, other people have not been affected by only being able to have one Sonos group stream per Pandora account except for OP?

User694694

Enthusiast II

OP, I guess I should have asked, is your client trying to play different Pandora stations on different zones at the location he is actively at? This is the problem that I ran into with Pandora. Apparently, unlike other streaming services, this is not allowed. I wish Pandora would reverse their position.

https://community.pandora.com/t5/Other-Devices/Sonos-Playing-two-stations-at-the-same-time/td-p/189323

The sound guyAuthor

Contributor I

No sir. Every location only streams one channel at a time. Although I've got multiple devices, there's only one channel at a time. My original thought was if location a is interrupted. That would mean location b would have to, through the Sonos app, log out of Pandora and log back in using another name and another password.

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