Flutter iOS Picture-in-Picture not showing when app goes to background (works only via button)

Question

I'm building an OTT video streaming app using Flutter and the video_player package. I want to implement Picture-in-Picture (PiP) on iOS.

Flutter doesn’t provide native PiP support for iOS directly, so I implemented it using Swift native code through a custom plugin.

The issue I’m facing is:

When I manually tap my custom PiP button, PiP starts successfully and works fine.

But when I put the app in the background (home button / swipe up) and try to start PiP automatically, PiP doesn’t appear — even though it seems to start internally.

This is my IosPipManager(swift)

import Foundation
import AVKit
import Flutter
public class IosPipManager: NSObject, FlutterPlugin {
private var pipController: AVPictureInPictureController?
private var playerLayer: AVPlayerLayer?
private var methodChannel: FlutterMethodChannel?
 public static func register(with registrar: FlutterPluginRegistrar) {
 let instance = IosPipManager()
 let channel = FlutterMethodChannel(name: "ios_pip_manager", binaryMessenger: registrar.messenger())
 instance.methodChannel = channel
 registrar.addMethodCallDelegate(instance, channel: channel)
 
 NotificationCenter.default.addObserver(
 instance,
 selector: #selector(instance.appDidEnterBackground),
 name: UIApplication.didEnterBackgroundNotification,
 object: nil
 )
 }
 
 @objc private func appDidEnterBackground() {
 guard let controller = pipController else {
 print("❌ No PiP controller when entering background")
 return
 }
 
 DispatchQueue.main.asyncAfter(deadline: .now() + 0.5) {
 if !controller.isPictureInPictureActive {
 print("🎥 Starting PiP automatically on background")
 controller.startPictureInPicture()
 }
 }
 }
 
 public func handle(_ call: FlutterMethodCall, result: @escaping FlutterResult) {
 switch call.method {
 case "initializePip":
 print("🎬 Initializing PiP from Flutter video_player")
 
 guard let viewController = UIApplication.shared.delegate?.window??.rootViewController else {
 result(FlutterError(code: "NO_VIEW", message: "No root view controller", details: nil))
 return
 }
 
 if let playerLayer = findPlayerLayer(in: viewController.view.layer) {
 print("✅ Found AVPlayerLayer from Flutter player")
 self.playerLayer = playerLayer
 self.pipController = AVPictureInPictureController(playerLayer: playerLayer)
 result(true)
 } else {
 print("❌ Couldn’t find AVPlayerLayer from Flutter video player")
 result(FlutterError(code: "NO_PLAYER_LAYER", message: "Couldn't find AVPlayerLayer from Flutter video player", details: nil))
 }
 
 case "startPip":
 print("▶️ startPip called")
 startPip(result: result)
 
 case "stopPip":
 print("⏹ stopPip called")
 stopPip(result: result)
 
 default:
 result(FlutterMethodNotImplemented)
 }
 }
 
 private func startPip(result: @escaping FlutterResult) {
 guard let controller = pipController else {
 result(FlutterError(code: "NOT_INITIALIZED", message: "PiP controller not initialized", details: nil))
 return
 }
 
 if !controller.isPictureInPictureActive {
 controller.startPictureInPicture()
 }
 result(true)
 }
 
 private func stopPip(result: @escaping FlutterResult) {
 guard let controller = pipController else {
 result(FlutterError(code: "NOT_INITIALIZED", message: "PiP controller not initialized", details: nil))
 return
 }
 
 if controller.isPictureInPictureActive {
 controller.stopPictureInPicture()
 }
 result(true)
 }
 
 private func findPlayerLayer(in layer: CALayer) -> AVPlayerLayer? {
 if let playerLayer = layer as? AVPlayerLayer {
 return playerLayer
 }
 for sublayer in layer.sublayers ?? [] {
 if let found = findPlayerLayer(in: sublayer) {
 return found
 }
 }
 return nil
 }
}
extension IosPipManager: AVPictureInPictureControllerDelegate {
public func pictureInPictureControllerDidStartPictureInPicture(\_ pictureInPictureController: AVPictureInPictureController) {
methodChannel?.invokeMethod("onPipStarted", arguments: nil)
}
 public func pictureInPictureControllerDidStopPictureInPicture(_ pictureInPictureController: AVPictureInPictureController) {
 methodChannel?.invokeMethod("onPipStopped", arguments: nil)
 }
 
 public func pictureInPictureController(_ pictureInPictureController: AVPictureInPictureController, failedToStartPictureInPictureWithError error: Error) {
 methodChannel?.invokeMethod("onPipError", arguments: error.localizedDescription)
 }
}

• Dibyendu: For android some packages are there, but in ios no package is working