Read Aloud can enter a persistent corrupted playback state after repeated activation

ChatGPT Bugs
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Environment

  • Surface: Android
  • Browser or app version: ChatGPT Android 1.2026.251
  • Affected feature and model, if relevant: Read Aloud; model not relevant
  • Device: Samsung Galaxy S26
  • OS: Android 16 / One UI 8.5

Bug

Read Aloud can occasionally enter a persistent broken playback state where it fails during playback with “Sorry, an error occurred.”

Once this happens for a message, retrying Read Aloud often fails again at the same playback position, so the message cannot be played to the end.

Force-stopping the app and clearing the application cache appears to resolve the issue, after which Read Aloud can generate/play the message normally again.

The issue appears more likely after accidentally pressing the Read Aloud button twice in rapid succession.

A correlated symptom is the playback progress UI: normally it starts as a simple linear progress/loading state and later becomes the full waveform/progress representation. After rapid repeated Read Aloud activation, the waveform sometimes never appears, even while playback continues.

Possible implementation clue (hypothesis only): rapid repeated activation may create overlapping generation/playback requests, or otherwise leave Read Aloud state inconsistent. A stale or superseded request may still update shared state after another request becomes active. This could potentially explain both the missing waveform/progress metadata and a later deterministic playback failure if part of the audio or buffer state is incomplete.

The fact that the failure tends to recur at the same playback position, and that clearing the app cache resolves it, also suggests that an invalid or partially generated local audio/cache state may be reused between retries.

There may also be a broader Read Aloud lifecycle/state issue: Read Aloud stops when navigating away from the current conversation, and a separate reproducible bug shows Read Aloud affecting Android text-selection state until the conversation is exited and reopened. These may be unrelated, but both point toward Read Aloud state creation, replacement, cleanup, or conversation lifecycle handling as areas worth checking.

Expected behavior:

  • Repeatedly pressing Read Aloud should not create competing or corrupted playback state.
  • If an existing generation is superseded, its results should not affect the currently active session.
  • A failed generation/playback should be invalidated so retrying can recover without requiring the user to clear the app cache.

Reproduction

The issue is intermittent, but this appears to increase the likelihood of triggering it:

  1. Open a conversation containing an assistant message long enough for Read Aloud to require progressive generation/loading.
  2. Press Read Aloud twice in rapid succession.
  3. Observe the playback progress UI.
  4. In affected runs, the UI may remain in the simple linear state and never transition to the full waveform/progress representation.
  5. Continue playback.
  6. Playback may later fail with “Sorry, an error occurred.”
  7. Retry Read Aloud on the same message.
  8. In affected cases, playback fails again at the same position.
  9. Force-stop ChatGPT and clear the app cache.
  10. Reopen the app and retry Read Aloud. The playback state is regenerated and the issue is typically resolved.

Diagnostics

Exact error or screenshot: “Sorry, an error occurred.” During affected runs, the waveform/progress UI may also fail to appear and remain in the simple linear state.
When it happened (with timezone) and how often: Observed multiple times over recent days, including 2026-09-13 around 16:50 CEST (UTC+2). It is intermittent, but appears more likely after pressing Read Aloud twice in rapid succession. Once a specific playback enters the broken state, retries often fail again at the same position until the app is force-stopped and its cache is cleared.