Feature Request: Pause Streaming Services and Automatically Use Alternative Sources

Feedback Feature Suggestions
1

Feature Request: Pause Streaming Services and Automatically Use Alternative Sources

Background

Many Roon users subscribe to more than one streaming service, such as Qobuz and TIDAL.

However, users may not want to maintain all subscriptions continuously. For example, a user may subscribe to Qobuz for several months, temporarily stop the subscription, and use TIDAL instead, while planning to return to Qobuz later.

Currently, Roon does not clearly distinguish between an account being disconnected, a subscription being inactive, and a service that the user intentionally wants to pause.

1. Proposed Feature: “Pause Service”

I would like to suggest adding a Pause Service or Suspend Service option under:

Settings → Services → Qobuz / TIDAL

For example:

Qobuz
Account: Connected
Status: Paused

When a service is paused, Roon should:

  • Stop using that service as an active streaming source.

  • Stop displaying playback/subscription warnings caused by the inactive subscription.

  • Exclude the paused service from normal streaming searches and playback selection.

  • Keep the user’s account connection and service configuration.

  • Preserve Roon playlists, favorites, tags, ratings, play history, and other Roon metadata.

  • Allow the user to resume the service later without having to go through the entire setup process again.

The important distinction would be:

Connected ≠ Active Subscription ≠ Paused

2. Automatically Use Another Active Streaming Service

An even more useful feature would be an option such as:

Use another active streaming service when the preferred service is unavailable

For example:

  • Qobuz is paused.

  • TIDAL remains active.

  • A Roon playlist contains a Qobuz recording.

  • Roon searches the user’s active services for the same recording.

  • If the same recording is available on TIDAL, Roon automatically uses the TIDAL version for playback.

The original playlist and metadata would remain unchanged.

Conceptually:

Original source

Qobuz → Playlist → Recording

Qobuz paused

Qobuz → unavailable
↓
Roon searches active services
↓
TIDAL → matching recording
↓
Playback

This should be treated as a playback-source substitution, rather than modifying or replacing the original playlist.

3. Preserve the Original Recording and Playlist

The automatic substitution should ideally preserve the user’s original selection.

For example, if the playlist contains:

Artist → Album → Track

Roon should first attempt to find the same:

  • Artist

  • Album

  • Track

  • Version, where possible

  • Quality, where possible

If the exact recording is unavailable, Roon could optionally fall back to the same track from another edition or release.

The user could also choose how strict the matching should be:

Exact recording only
or
Same track is acceptable

This would be particularly useful for live recordings, remasters, deluxe editions, and other cases where multiple versions exist.

4. Subscription-State Handling

It would also be useful if Roon could distinguish between:

  1. Account disconnected

  2. Account connected but subscription inactive

  3. Service intentionally paused by the user

  4. Active subscription

For example, instead of repeatedly showing:

“Unable to play — please subscribe to Qobuz”

Roon could show:

Qobuz subscription inactive
Your Qobuz account is still connected.
Qobuz is currently paused in Roon.

This would make the state of each service much clearer.

5. Example

A user has:

Service

Account

Status

Playback

Qobuz

Connected

Paused

Use alternative

TIDAL

Connected

Active

Available

Local Music

-–

Active

Available

When playing music, Roon would simply use the available active source.

When the user subscribes to Qobuz again:

Resume Qobuz

Qobuz becomes active again, without requiring the user to rebuild playlists or manually reconnect everything.

6. Why This Would Be Valuable

This would turn Roon into a much more effective unified music library across multiple streaming services.

Instead of users having to think:

“Which service does this playlist belong to?”

they could simply think:

“This is my Roon music library.”

The streaming services would become interchangeable sources behind the Roon interface.

This would be especially valuable for users who:

  • Rotate subscriptions between Qobuz and TIDAL.

  • Temporarily cancel a service to reduce subscription costs.

  • Maintain multiple streaming subscriptions.

  • Want to compare different streaming catalogs or versions.

  • Have accumulated playlists from different services.

  • Want to preserve their Roon library independently of any single streaming provider.

In short, I would suggest that Roon treat streaming services as interchangeable content sources rather than permanently attached playlist destinations.

That would make the multi-service experience considerably more seamless.

2

@Sujung_Yan I moved your post to Feedback > Feature Suggestions so Roon staff can see and evaluate it.

1 Like
3

This immediately made me wonder how many Roon users there really are that jump back, and forth, between streaming services on a continueing basis, canceling the one they are not using?

My guess it’s a very small number to try to justify such a project. Maybe I don’t see it because I just subscribe to both services I use at the same time. I suppose we’ll see how much attention this gets.

1 Like
4

Thanks for the thoughtful comment. I agree that subscribing to both services simultaneously is certainly the simplest solution, and for many users that may be exactly what they prefer.

At the same time, I think the actual number of users who switch between services may be difficult for us to estimate from the outside. Roon itself is probably in a much better position to evaluate this through its usage data and user feedback.

Also, the use case can be a little more complicated than simply “cancel one service and subscribe to another.” Some users may have accumulated playlists, favorites, listening history, or other content relationships across different services. Others may simply want to pause a subscription temporarily while keeping their Roon setup intact.

And I think there is another point worth considering: not having a need today doesn’t necessarily mean there won’t be one in the future. Subscription pricing, service catalogs, availability, and users’ listening habits can all change.

I’m certainly not suggesting that Roon should undertake a major project just for a relatively small group of users. My thought is that, if the underlying architecture already supports multiple streaming services, relatively small improvements could make the experience much more seamless.

For example, a simple “Pause Service” option could allow a user to temporarily stop using a service without logging out or generating subscription warnings, while preserving their Roon playlists and metadata. A further step could allow Roon to use an equivalent recording from another active service when the preferred service is unavailable.

In the end, Roon has the actual usage data to determine whether the demand is significant enough to justify development. I’m simply suggesting that there may be more use cases than are immediately visible, and that making multiple streaming services more interchangeable could make Roon more flexible for users without adding much complexity to the user experience.

If it can make the experience easier for some users without getting in the way of those who simply subscribe to both services, why not? :slightly_smiling_face: