Promised Xbox One Background Music Playback Support Won’t Arrive Before Summer

In an interview last November, Mike Ybarra, who leads the New Xbox One Experience, had this to say about background music:

It's on the backlog and Phil reminds me almost every day about it. The great thing about Windows 10 on Xbox One is that it really allows us to increase the efficiency of the system, other tasks that take resources to run become easier for us to implement. Background music is something we know our fans want, it's on our list, and we're definitely looking at it.

While it’s definitely on Microsoft’s radar, Xbox Chief Phil Spencer shot down the notion that support would be added anytime soon in via Twitter this week:

@TheEjderha83 Won't be before summer sorry to say.

— Phil Spencer (@XboxP3) January 14, 2016

This is definitely disappointing news for gamers that have been waiting patiently for background music playback, and many were quick to raise their pitchforks in response to Spencer. “As a consumer, this is absolute bulls**t. Parties are background apps and this kind of stuff has been around since 360,” exclaimed Blacking V. Jonny Rose chimed in adding, “It wouldnt be such an issue if the music in #Forza 5 & 6 wasnt so appauling! WHY ELEVATOR MUSIC? <=Forza4 was amazing.”

But perhaps Pierre summed it up the best, stating, “Really is baffling why a feature of a 10y old console can be so hard to replicate on XOne Would love to know why!?”

Whatever the reasons, it’s at least comforting to know that Microsoft is working on the matter. Now, whether we’ll see it this summer, or perhaps in the fall remains to be seen. It doesn’t really appear to be a high priority for Microsoft right now, or perhaps the company is waiting for the Windows 10 Redstone update to usher in the feature for the Xbox One.