This might be a basic limitation of the PlayAndRecord audio session when it isn’t used in combination with the VoiceChat mode (btw, the VoiceChat mode didn’t have this side-effect of changing interaction with media object playback in previous versions of iOS, and could easily cease having it in the future, which is part of the reason I don’t build the framework around special audio mode behaviors) but you can also try to turn on PocketsphinxController’s audioSessionMixing property to see if it is a session mixing issue rather than the somewhat buggy playback issue with VoiceChat.