Support

“RowBeats doesn’t have Apple Music access”

This is a permission on your phone rather than a login, so there’s nothing to sign into. If you turned it down the first time, turn it back on in Settings › Apps › RowBeats › Media & Apple Music (on iOS 17 or earlier, Settings › RowBeats › Media & Apple Music). The Open Settings button on the RowBeats home screen takes you straight there.

On a managed or Screen Time restricted device the switch may not be available at all. That’s a restriction set elsewhere on the phone, and RowBeats can’t override it.

“… which needs an active subscription”

RowBeats plays full tracks through Apple Music, which needs a current subscription. The 30-second previews on the playlist screen can’t stand in for a workout, and RowBeats doesn’t sell a subscription of its own. Get Apple Music shows Apple’s own offer without leaving the app, and RowBeats checks again when you close it.

If you do subscribe and still see this, tap I already subscribe, check again under the button. A check that failed to go through looks much the same to the app as not subscribing, so it asks rather than assumes.

“We couldn’t confirm your Apple Music connection”

The check failed to go through; nothing is wrong with your account. Make sure the phone really has a connection, because gym and hotel Wi-Fi that wants you to sign in first looks connected and answers nothing. Then tap Check connection.

A playlist shorter than I asked for (“Only filled … of … min”)

A track only makes the list if it matches a genre and era you chose and its beat lands on your stroke-rate range. Narrow settings can leave too little to fill the time.

The fix is to add genres or widen the SPM range. Two notes:

• Add genres rather than swapping them. Trading one genre for another can leave a smaller pool than you started with.
• A wider stroke-rate range helps more than it looks like it should, because it opens up several tempo multiples at once.

If the message also mentions a temporary problem looking up song tempos, your settings aren’t the cause. See the next answer.

“There's a temporary problem looking up song tempos”

Tempos come from other services, and now and then they can’t be reached. RowBeats never fills the gap with music that isn’t matched to your stroke rate. You get the matched songs it could find as a shorter playlist, or no playlist if none matched.

It usually comes back on its own. Try building again in a few minutes.

I keep getting the same songs

You shouldn’t: anything you rowed to in the last month is left out of the next playlist. If a song still comes back, it’s usually a different recording of it. A single, an album version and a remaster count as three separate tracks.

If you row often with the same genres and stroke rate, a longer gap helps: choose up to three months under Recently played on the Settings screen. When the songs that fit your settings run out, the ones you heard longest ago come back first. Adding genres or widening the stroke-rate range gives RowBeats more to choose from.

The opposite is also yours to choose: Clear history under Recently played on the Settings screen forgets the history, so everything is eligible again.

Explicit tracks are still appearing

Turn on Exclude explicit tracks under Refine on Genre row; Album row and Artist row have the same box. It stays on until you turn it off. RowBeats filters on the rating Apple publishes for each recording, so anything Apple hasn’t flagged will get through.

Album row or Artist row won’t build

Both check every song’s tempo with the RowBeats tempo service when you choose the album or the artist. If the message ends “Try again in a few minutes”, that check couldn’t be made just now, and it usually can be soon.

An album that says some of its songs “can’t be matched to a stroke rate” or have “no beat to row to” has changed since it went on the shelf. RowBeats doesn’t build an album with a song missing, so choose another. On Artist row, “Not enough … songs at this stroke rate” means the artist’s Essentials have too little at your range: widen the stroke rate, or take the wider range Artist row offers.

The music stopped and the timer is frozen

A stream that runs dry mid-track gives no warning; it simply stops. RowBeats watches for that and offers a way out. Skip to the next track, or pause and start again.

If your phone dropped off the network you’ll see a card saying so, and the play and skip buttons go away until the connection is back. They return by themselves.

Nothing plays after the count-in

The track is asked for the moment the count reaches zero, so on a slow connection, or over AirPlay and some Bluetooth speakers, it can take a few seconds more to be audible. If it never starts, the screen offers a way to move on.

1. Press any button

to wake the monitor. A PM5 sleeps a couple of minutes after the flywheel stops. Press a button rather than taking a stroke, because a stroke starts the PM5 counting and your workout would begin part-rowed.

2. Press Connect

on the main menu. On older monitors: Menu › More Options › Turn Wireless ON.

3. Disconnect it elsewhere

The PM5 pairs with one app or device at a time. Close anything else connected to it, or disconnect from the monitor’s own menu. That could be another phone, a watch, or an app you had forgotten about.

“Nothing answered in 30 seconds”

A scan runs for a fixed window and then stops itself, so the radio is never left running behind your back. If nothing answered, the monitor is most likely asleep, off its Connect screen, or already paired with something else. Work through the three steps above and search again.

Bluetooth errors

• “RowBeats doesn’t have Bluetooth access”: enable it in Settings › Apps › RowBeats › Bluetooth (on iOS 17 or earlier, Settings › RowBeats › Bluetooth).
• “Bluetooth is turned off”: turn it on in Control Center or Settings, and the search starts by itself.
• “The RowERG disconnected”: the monitor went to sleep, moved out of range, or another app took the connection. Wake it and connect again. During a workout RowBeats first tries for 30 seconds by itself, with Reconnecting to the RowERG on the player, and the music plays on.