It is fairly OK in terms of the compatibility across Apple products - as always for the ecosystem. However, the way it works is totally poor - when the apps is closed (either by user or somehow killed by iOS) the airplay connection drops. In opposite, content played by chromecast seems to sustain individually, regardless of the apps status.

Even I am using iPhone and have an Apple computer at home, a chromecast hardware is installed and more frequently used than Airplay.

Do anyone else experience similar as me?

  • wmdpstl@alien.topB
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    1 year ago

    Works perfectly with Infuse.

    You can even use your iDevice and Airplay just works in background.

    Why should I Airplay a youtube video when I have YouTube on Apple TV?

  • chickentataki99@alien.topB
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    1 year ago

    AirPlay is great for spur of the moment stuff, but AirPlay is trash compared to what Spotify connect is. Coming from a 15 year Apple fanboy, if Apple figured out a way to compete with Spotify connect they’d dominate in a dangerous way.

    • vewfndr@alien.topB
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      1 year ago

      Never looked into it, but I get the feeling Spotify has a patent on that feature. No one else offers the same functionality even though it’s a damn good one that seems simple.

      • chickentataki99@alien.topB
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        1 year ago

        It’s such a logical thing to “handoff” audio but Apple is 5 years behind on it. I should t have to pause my entire phones audio when I want to stream to a speaker group.

  • Z3ROS1X@alien.topB
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    1 year ago

    When your apps close the connection won’t drop if you use screen mirroring to do AirPlay. Give it a try. 😉

  • autokiller677@alien.topB
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    1 year ago

    Why do you (force) close the app though?

    I never had this problem. An app actively playing media (and properly telling this to iOS, so media controls appear) also does not get killed by iOS.

    • Independent-Bear-604@alien.topOPB
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      1 year ago

      Sometimes when I do a lot of multi-tasking, the app is killed by iOS. A possible flaw could be from the app itself, but the logic behind airplay also plays a key part.

      • autokiller677@alien.topB
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        1 year ago

        It is most definitely a problem of the app. I have never seen an app actively playing media being terminated by iOS. That’s really disruptive for the user, and Apple usually protects the user experience from stuff like this. But do to this, the app has to correctly communicate to iOS that it is actively playing media.

        The upside of AirPlay is that it works with everything. Chromecast needs to be supported by the service you want to cast so the phone can hand off the connection to the Chromecast (something that AirPlay can actually also do, at least for video). But if an app / service does not support it, using the device as a streaming relay is the only way to enable casting of basically everything.

      • _mikedotcom@alien.topB
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        1 year ago

        Wild that in 2023 you have to explain that you want to multitask on an iPhone and getting downvoted for it.

  • hieubuirtz@alien.topB
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    1 year ago

    Not a comparison. The equivalent to chromecast is the remote control to apple tv. Airplay is just a way to cast whatever is playing to a different screen whereas chromecast is a remote control to tell the target device to play what you want (all decoding and processing are done on the target device)

  • linuxgfx@alien.topB
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    1 year ago

    for me the biggest issue is that, if i stream a song or a video via airplay and want to look or hear something else on my phone, the stream stops and the new audio/video starts playing on the streaming device. Chromecast doesn’t have that problem, i can stream music from spotify to the home speakers and watch a youtube video on my phone, at the same time without interfering.

    • LosLocoDK@alien.topB
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      1 year ago

      No problem. Just change control source (or “unit” or whatever the correct term is) on your iPhone before playing something new, and your airplay will continue while you can see your other thing on your phone.

      • metricrules@alien.topB
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        11 months ago

        Never heard of that, how do you do it and why do I have to do that?

        It’s like when I’m listening to the radio and scrolling something that has auto play ads and it continuously cuts off the radio in favour of the ad. It just shouldn’t happen

    • sky_walker6@alien.topB
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      1 year ago

      Wait that’s what I love most about it versus Bluetooth. I can connect and still use my phone without the sound playing through speakers. Why is ours different?

  • No-Pepper-1228@alien.topB
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    1 year ago

    New iPhone 15 Pro user here coming from 13 years of Android. IMHO AirPlay works much better than Chromecast. More reliable, more seamless connection and faster in general.

  • HipsterCosmologist@alien.topB
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    1 year ago

    If you have an appleTV (how I play music through my stereo) you can “control other devices” and play apple music for instance without it needing to run on the initiating device. Same happens for some other apps, where the receiving app can take over.

    • marvin69420@alien.topB
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      1 year ago

      I think op should’ve been more clear, I’m assuming he doesn’t have an Apple TV device and is using AirPlay built into a modern tv, which I am doing a home theater setup with new 8k tvs and will still opt to use an Apple TV 4K (till the 8k comes out) lossless music to the stereo and no ads when streaming my content. It’s a tv using an Apple api no apple hardware whatsoever

  • Lonely-Captain-5562@alien.topB
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    1 year ago

    That’s because I believe Apple Music is the only service which will play through the AirPlay device with your iPhone being simply a remote. Every other service is simply cast from your phone (plays directly on your phone) so closing the app terminates the streaming. It’s definitely inferior to Chromecast and Spotify connect in the way this works but it’s just Apple’s closed ecosystem

  • justTheWayOfLife@alien.topB
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    1 year ago

    it’s because chromecast devices have in-built apps like yt, spotify, etc whatever you’re streaming so it’s actually not your phone streaming but chromecast itself (or the in-built chromecast in your smarttv) that’s why you can do whatever in the background on your phone while the stream continues

    not the same for devices with airplay functionality, except appleTV.