The connection drops during a game
Phone and host talk over your Wi‑Fi. Lock the phone, switch apps or change networks and the connection breaks – but you keep your seat in the room.
Bring Gather back to the front
When the screen is locked or Gather is in the background, the connection pauses. Unlock the phone and open Gather again. “Reconnecting …” appears at the top until you’re back.
Stay on the same Wi‑Fi
If the phone has switched to mobile data or another Wi‑Fi network, reconnect it to the host’s network.
Return to the same seat
In the app, the “Back to the room” card with the room code takes you back to your old seat. In the browser, reload the page – the browser remembered your seat for this room.
Check the host
Still stuck? Look at the host: is Gather still running there? If Gather is closed on the host, the room is gone and you’ll need to open a new one.
When a room ends
A room only lives in the host’s memory. If nobody has been connected for a quarter of an hour, it’s cleaned up – after 24 hours at the latest. Gather then says “The room was inactive for too long.”
Tips
- Keep your phone unlocked during long games, or set Auto-Lock to a longer time.
- This matters even more when an iPhone is the host: if Gather is closed there, the game ends for everyone.