Remote Control function no longer working on multiple players, suspect Plex Server Bug at this point

Plex Media Server
1

For months now, I’ve no longer been able to use various plex players to control other players. Others have posted about this problem and gotten no response from Plex.

Here is another threat mentioning the same issue here: Other devices don‘t work as remote control anymore

Since this is impacting virtually all players, I’m posting this here as it might be a server issue, and not a player issue.

I used to use Plex Player for Android to remotely control Plex for Xbox so that I could play music on my stereo system in my living area without having to have the TV on or using the Xbox remote. Similarly, I used to use my android phone to control Plex Web when playing music on my computer in the office or on small (headless) Rasberry PI units connected to audio systems.

Not having this functionality is a HUGE loss to the Plex Community and it would be great if Plex would awknowledge the issue and provide us with a response on either:
A) How they are going to fix it
B) What further information they need from the community to help them fix it

Below is my personal information which I can confirm has not worked in at least six months with any combination of the following:
Plex Server for Synology - ver 1.18.9.2571
Plex Server for FreeBSD - ver 1.18.9.2571
Plex Player for Android - ver 7.30.1.16475
Plex Player for Windows - ver 1.6.5.1097-3bb9dc68
Plex Web - ver 4.31.1

2

Try turning off one of your servers. and probably restart the other. Multiple servers on the same network will cause them not to show up because the devices will only talk to one of them for companion.

3

The servers are located on different networks but I did setup a point to point VPN between them a few weeks ago, so they all are on private (RFC1918) IP addresses now and can talk to each other without having to tunnel through the Internet. Is this really a problem? Would this be a bug then? I thought the remote only talked to things on the same subnet?

4

No other help? What port and protocol is used to discover the other players and communicate the commands?

5

Responding to say I’m having similar issues. I’m using the web player (v4.30.2 Chrome Mac) to attempt to fling to my iOS player (v7.0 iOS 13.5). The iOS player appears just fine, but when I fling, playback never starts on the iPhone (the player doesn’t recognize the fling attempt).

However, if I cast from iOS to the web player, that works as expected and I can control the Web Player playback from my iPhone.

Quick Update: I discovered my newly created server was “unclaimed” after restarting the plexmediaserver service on my Raspberry Pi 3b. Claiming it made the remote and fling feature in my case start working as expected in both directions.