Quick Links
Spotify, in a span of just a few years, managed to do the impossible. The platform not only completely changed the way we listen to music, but also managed to stay on top of the food chain in the years since. Even though giants like Amazon, YouTube, and Apple have been trying to steal Spotify’s top spot, the service that started it all has been the most popular streaming platform choice for years.
This popularity isn’t due only to the extensive library of music, podcasts and audiobooks that the platform offers, but also all the new features and ways of discovering new content that it’s known for. Over the years, the service expanded from simply delivering music to doing so much more. It’s now offering ways to listen with friends, algorithms that keep your playlists fresh, and tons of other goodies to make your music listening experience even more engaging.
Spotify Premium takes the fight to Audible with access to over 150,000 audiobooks
You’ll get 15 hours of listening included with your subscription.
So, whether you want to try out Spotify for the first time, or if you’re already a lover of this music streaming service, here’s everything you need to know about Spotify, as we’re going on a deep dive into how the platform works and all the features that it offers.
How does Spotify work?
Millions of songs at a tap of your finger
Spotify lets you access a massive and ever-growing library of audio (and video) content basically wherever you are in the world, as long as you have an internet connection – and even that can be optional. you’re able to also download tracks, albums and other content for listening offline, making it a great choice even if you’re really far from civilization.
5 Spotify Premium features I use to maximize my subscription
Whether you’re new to Spotify or just want the best bang for your buck, these features can match music to your mood, build your catalog, and more.
Spotify is wonderfully multi-device capable too. So you may listen on your phone, computer, TV, smart speaker and many other devices. There are Spotify apps you can download from your favorite app store, but you can also access it via the web or cast it from your phone to other devices, along with more traditional Bluetooth connections as well. Couple that with easy integrations with different smart home systems, and you get an extremely versatile music streaming service.
Downloading music from Spotify is a rather delicate subject. Theoretically, yes, you can do that. However, it’s not the kind of downloading you’d normally think of. With a Spotify Premium plan you can set music to be available “offline,” but it’s not the same as downloading music in the traditional sense.
For example, you’re able to’t try to game the system by downloading an album and then canceling your subscription later. And you can’t download the tracks to burn them to a CD or copy them to other devices. You will not have the music files available anywhere on your drive, they are only downloaded as part of the Spotify app on your mobile device and can’t be transferred anywhere else.
The idea ofSpotify’s offline modeis to allow you to have access to your favorite music when you’re trying tosave mobile dataor traveling somewhere where access to the internet might not be easy.
As we’ve mentioned, the ability to download tracks is one of the benefits of a paid Spotify subscription. With Spotify Premium, you may have up to 10,000 songs available to listen to offline on up to five different devices. Downloading songs, albums, or playlists on Spotify is simple too. Just switch the toggle next to Download on the album you’d like to download to listen offline. Alternatively, click the three dots in the top right and click “Download.”
How much data does Spotify use?
As you can imagine, since Spotify requires you to be online to use it, this means it uses some of your mobile data to play songs and content. It’s worth remembering this, especially if you have a monthly data limit on your phone or broadband connection.
The amount of data that Spotify burns through will depend on the streaming quality you choose. The higher quality music you opt for, the more data will be used in order to stream it. This is a rough guide covering how much data Spotify will get through:
You can check and change the quality of streaming and downloading of songs using mobile data in the settings on your device.
High-quality streaming and audio quality
Getting a great pair of headphones is crucial if you want to get the most out of your music, but the quality of music files themselves is equally important. Currently, Spotify offers four different stream quality levels that you can choose from in order to pick between the amount of data you’re using and the quality of the song you’re listening to. Streaming is all done in the Ogg Vorbis format and uses the following bitrates for each of the quality levels:
Does Spotify offer Hi-Fi music streaming?
Lossless audio might be coming to Spotify – here’s what we know
Spotify Hi-Fi keeps getting delayed, so what gives? There are some new rumors – and perhaps new features.
Spotify has long promised to include an option for hi-res audio streaming. In fact, the company first officially promised this feature back in 2021. Unfortunately, with each passing year, it seems we’re not getting any closer to getting a true audiophile-grade streaming option from Spotify.
That being said, the option is still supposed to come out eventually. Once it goes live, it’ll reportedly require a higher-tier subscription in order to allow you to play hi-res music files, so be ready to increase your subscription fees in order to get the best music available.
A free account is all you need to start listening
Before you’re able to enjoy all the benefits of Spotify, you’ll need an account. Don’t be afraid though – Spotify offers the ability to enjoy some of its functionalities for free, so you don’t have to start your subscription right away to enjoy music through the platform. What’s more, getting started with listening to music on Spotify is easy:
Spotify is a popular audio streaming platform that offers music, audiobooks, and podcasts. It can be used on mobile and on desktop, allowing you to listen to music in a ton of different places. You can even download music to your smartwatch.
The basic setup is pretty straightforward, but there’s much more to Spotify once you delve in, and it gets smarter the more you listen.
How to find people and friends on Spotify
Use your socials to stay in touch
Signing up to Spotify with Facebook orconnecting your Facebookaccount at a later date will allow you to easily find and follow friends and see what they’re listening to.
The activity feed is displayed on the right-hand side of the desktop software and is a great way to pick up on friends who listen to the same music as you or poke fun at them for their latest ABBA session.
You can also use the search function within the app tofind friends. Head into your profile in settings and tap on the “Find Friends” button, which will allow you to find and follow more friends or artists.
If you’re not on Facebook or don’t want to connect your Facebook account to Spotify, you can still find and follow friends. It just might be a bit more difficult in some cases.
Can you find friends on Spotify without Facebook?
Whether you don’t have Facebook or don’t want to use it to connect to Spotify, you don’t have to miss out on connecting with your friends on Spotify. There are a handful of other ways to follow your friends' profiles.
The first one that comes to mind is searching for them directly in the app. According to Spotify, the best way to find and follow a friend is to use the search box on the desktop client and use this format:
spotify:user:USERNAME
Copy the above and replace USERNAME with the name of your friend. Of course, you’ll need to ask them for their nickname first, so this kind of ruins the element of surprise. If this doesn’t work, ask your friend to either copy their profile link directly from their profile page and have them send it to you. Alternatively, ask if they can share one of their public playlists with you and click on their name there to follow them.
There’s one more, arguably more convenient way. If you use a Spotify Code, you may quickly share your profile with countless others, making it a quick and easy way to get your account some traction. If you’re interested in this method, we’ll explain it in more detail later on.
For more detailed guidance on finding friends on Spotify,see Spotify’s official tutorial.
Spotify playlists, radio and discovering new music
Taste the music
Spotify is smart and reactive to your tastes. The more you listen, the more Spotify learns the sort of music you like and that has an impact on the music it will present to you in the future. When you delve into the “Home” section of the app, you’ll find a number of recommendations based on your recent listening choices. This includes artists similar to those you’ve already been listening to, as well as your “Discover Weekly”, “Release Radar”, “Top Songs of [year]” and “Family Mix” playlists, among others.
7 Spotify tricks for getting out of a music funk
Stuck in a constant playlist shuffle? Sick of playing the same songs on repeat? Here are my favorite Spotify features to mix up your sound.
However, the best way to make your listening experience really your own is by creating various playlists for different moods and occasions. Creating a playlist is as easy as right-clicking a song that you like and clickingAdd to Playlist. You then pick a playlist that it should be added to, or create another one to match the new vibes, and you’re good to go. Grab your favorite songs and stick them on a playlist for your personal listening pleasure.
Once you get started, you’ll soon find yourself swimming in all kinds of moody tunes to choose from for every kind of day. What’s even better, you can also follow playlists made by friends or curated by artists. That way, you can match the mood of a party you’re going to or simply get the hang of someone else’s music taste.
What is Discovery Weekly?
“Discover Weekly” is a playlist that’s automatically updated by Spotify each Monday and includes a number of different songs based on what you’ve been listening to recently. It’s a great way to discover new songs that already fit your personal taste.
What is Release Radar?
“Release Radar” is a selection of new tracks from artists you follow. It’s worth noting here that if you follow your favorite musicians you’ll get notifications and updates when they release new content too.
What about the other mixes?
“Family Mix” combines music listened to by anyone on a Premium for Family subscription, and you can choose between Chill or Upbeat. To discover new music, you can either tap on the “Home” tab where you’ll find plenty of options, or you can go to the “Search” tab to search for new content by category and genre. These are great ways to discover new music that’s similar to your current taste but ones that you might not have otherwise listened to.
What is Spotify Blend?
Spotify offers a type of playlist that lets you and a friend mix your music tastes. These are called Blends. The music streaming service takes the musical tastes of you and a friend and creates a playlist. Not only does it make a playlist, but it also lets you know how much your musical tastes overlap.
What is Spotify Enhance?
In September 2021, Spotify released a nifty update to its mobile app to help you upgrade your playlists. Enhance is a button you may press that sits at the top of your playlists. Tapping the button fleshes out the playlist with extra songs along similar lines. Personalized music recommendations based on your current listening habits.
The enhance button adds extra songs to your playlist, interspersed between those already added by yourself. You’ll get one extra song after every two of your own tracks with a maximum of 30 extra ones being added to your playlist.
If you like what you see, then you may click the plus button to add each track permanently. If you’re not a fan of the additions, you can click enhance again, and it’ll remove what was added, like an undo button.Enhance is rolling outto multiple regions. If you don’t see it now, you should in the near future.
How to create playlists for your pets
Spotify has apparently carried out some research and found that a large percentage of pet owners specifically play tunes for their pets.
To help create the perfect listening experience for pet owners, the company has created a tool to help you create apets playlist. Getting started with it is easy too:
These pet-centric playlists are based on your musical preference, only catering to your pet’s mood and disposition.
How to manage playlists in Spotify Kids
Spotify Kidsis an app specifically designed for young children who are part of a household that already has a Spotify Premium plan.
This app caters to children listening from age three and up and is designed to be “safe” and private too. As you’d expect, the music here is more interactive with singalong songs, film soundtracks and even stories.
Listening content on this app also includes tunes hand-picked by a dedicated team of editors to ensure great listening for your little ones.
The app is also designed to be kid-friendly to make it engaging and user-friendly too.
It has rolled out in most of the world, including the US, Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, UK, Australia, Denmark, Sweden, New Zealand, and more. Like the main Spotify app, Spotify Kids is also available forAndroidandiOS devices.
What are Spotify Codes?
Spotify Codesis a feature on Spotify that allows users to easily share music with friends and family, as well as their accounts for others to follow. you’re able to use it to generate a unique code for a song, album, playlist, or your profile, and then get someone else to scan the code to share it with their device and allow them to enjoy it too or follow you.
Spotify Codes works on both iPhone and Android devices. To use it, you need to click the ‘…’ button next to what you want to share, and you’ll see a pop-up with the album, song, or playlist artwork, and the code sits underneath. Click that code to zoom in so the other person can scan it.
On the other device, tap on the search tab at the bottom, then tap the search bar at the top. There is a camera icon in the top right, which, if you launch, you’ll then be able to simply scan the code. Spotify Codes is open to everyone.
Outside of Spotify Codes, you can also easily directly share songs from Spotify across a number of social media platforms, including Facebook, Twitter, Skype, Tumblr or just a straight link to copy a usable link to wherever you want on the web. Simply right-click on the desktop or press the three dots on your mobile by the song, album, artist or playlist you want to share and select the appropriate service.
What are Spotify Mixes?
Spotify learns what you like as you use it. The more you listen, the more intelligent it becomes. This music streaming service is brilliant for this sort of intelligence. Automatic playlists are then created based on your preferences. This includes automated playlists likeSummer Rewind, which feature all the songs you’ve been listening to most over the last few months.
Mixes are slightly different, they’re like a radio station that mixes your favorite tunes with similar music Spotify thinks you’ll enjoy. Multiple Mixes are available for different artists, moods and more. These individual mixes keep playing for as long as you want to listen and can be improved by liking the songs you enjoy or removing the ones you don’t.
How to find Spotify Made for You Playlists
In addition to Mixes, Spotify also has a variety of playlists ‘Made for You’ based on your listening habits. For example, if you’re looking for the perfect party playlist, Spotify has a playlist ready for you based on what you typically listen to. All you need to do is search Made for You in the search bar, and you’ll see a variety of playlists showing up for any mood you may be in. You can also find your daylist, which takes into account what you listen and when you listen to it, by seaching for “Daylist” here.
Spotify Private listening mode
Listening on Spotify can be a social experience. If you’ve connected Spotify to your Facebook account, for example, then friends and family will be able to see what you’re listening to and you may share your favorite songs with them. There might be occasions though, where you don’t want people to know that you’re listening to a certain album or song on constant repeat. We all have the guilty pleasure that we don’t need the world to know about.
Spotify accounts for this with a “private listening mode” that you can activate from the settings in the app, under Social, and a quick click of a button on the desktop browser.
Spotify’s connectivity options with smart homes and Bluetooth
Great tunes everywhere you go
One of the obvious benefits of Spotify is if you’re using it on your phone then you can connect to a wealth of different Bluetooth devices and stream your content that way. Whether that means a home audio receiver, head unit in your car, Bluetooth headphones or Bluetooth-connected speaker - there are plenty of possibilities. With Spotify Premium you can also take advantage of Spotify Connect.
What is Spotify Connect?
Spotify Connectallows you to play your music through a variety of different Wi-Fi-connected devices, including everything from Wi-Fi speakers to your television,Amazon Echo,Google Home,Chromecast, PC, and much more.
This is great because it means you may listen to your music in more places and with more devices. It also offers you a choice about how you control the music playing on your Spotify account. For example, if you’re streaming to speakers in your lounge using your phone then you can use it as a remote control to adjust the volume, change tracks or create a party playlist while listening.
Spotify’s connectivity with Amazon Echo and Google Home
If you’re the proud owner of a smart home speaker likeGoogle HomeorAmazon Echothen listening to your favorite tunes on Spotify is also a breeze. All you need to do is set up Spotify as your primary music service inside the relevant app, then use your voice to command the speakers to play whatever you want.
If you have multiple devices, you can also take advantage ofmulti-room audiofunctionality to broadcast Spotify tunes throughout your home. Connecting and creating groups for these devices, then broadcasting music or a playlist to those groups with your voice, is a straightforward affair and one of the highlights of owning an AI-powered smart speaker.
Connect with friends thanks to Spotify Jam Session
Spotify’s Jam Session is a great tool that blends sharing your music with hanging out with friends. Thanks to that feature, you’re able to collectively, with up to 31 friends, create your own, shared playlist – and all that in real time. It’s an awesome tool if you’re setting up a party and want everyone’s music tastes to be included. you may then play the resulting queue over the speaker for the whole party to jam to, or let everyone listen to it in their own homes.
Cost for Spotify: Free, Premium, and Premium for Family
Pick the right plan for you
Spotify comes in two main forms - free and Premium. Spotify Premium is $11.99 a month for an individual, which includes access to features such as ad-free streaming, unlimited skips, extreme quality streaming, and Spotify Connect. Keep in mind that the Premium subscription comes in four models: Premium Individual, Premium Duo, Premium Family, and Premium Student, each with its own bonuses and advantages.
If multiple people in your house use Spotify, you might considerPremium for Family which gives up to six people access to their own unique Spotify account under one bill. All users have to live at the same address, so it’s not a package to include your friends in, but it’s a good way to split the cost. It costs $19.99 per month, helping you save quite a few bucks in the process.
6 ways to get Spotify Premium for free
If you’re finally finished with an ad ruining your perfect playlist, here’s how to get Premium benefits for free.
There’s also Spotify Duo that costs $16.99 a month for two Premium accounts – a nice deal for a pair to get their grooves on together. For students, a discounted plan costs just $5.99 a month, but you’ll need to show a valid student ID to be eligible for the discount.
What do you get with Spotify Free?
You can use Spotify for free, but its features are limited. On the free plan, music can be played in shuffle mode, and you can skip up to six times per hour, every hour. Spotify Radio isn’t available, but you can access Daily Mix playlists.
With the Spotify free plan, you can access all playlists, discover new music and share tunes with friends. You can also play any playlist, album, or artist, but only while in Shuffle Play mode.
Spotify is free to use on a mobile, desktop, or tablet app, so it’s accessible with ease wherever you are. You can access the free version using the smartphone app, desktop software or website. It’s the same app whether you’re paying or using Spotify for free.
What do you get with Spotify Premium?
Premium users can play any song they want (on demand), find and hear playlists, discover new music, create and edit playlists, and share music and playlists. Premium users can also skip any track, listen offline, hear high-quality music, and use the Spotify app on their mobile device as a computer remote control.
Spotify audiobooks and podcasts
Music is not your only option
Spotify is more than just a music streaming service. If you have a Spotify account, you’re able to also use it to listen to thousands of different podcasts that include everything from comedy to sports, lifestyle, news and more. These podcasts are available on both the app and the desktop browser, and it’s easy to hunt down and followyour favorite podcastsand access the latest episodes wherever you are. You can listen to podcasts on Premium or free accounts, but again, Premium unlocks more features and sometimes, bonus content.
Which is the best audiobook service, Audible or Spotify Premium?
Audible and Spotify Premium are going head-to-head for premium audiobook supremacy.
The Premium account level of Spotify also added audiobook access in 2023, making it a comparable platform to long-time favorites likeAudibleand new to the scene services like Scribd and Libro.fm. Spotify Premium has a smaller selection of around 300,000 audiobook titles, compared to Audible’s larger catalog, which could be a detractor for some. But you get access to these audiobooks through your Spotify Premium account, so the price is wrapped into the Premium account cost.
How to make Spotify sound better
There’s no hi-res audio, but there are ways to make Spotify sound perfect
Some audio snobs will tell you that Spotify’s quality isn’t good enough. We think it sounds great, but there are things you can do to make it sound even better. Dive into the settings on the app, and you’ll see various settings that you can turn on or tweak to improve the listening quality. If you’re not worried about data use, then it’s worth changing some of these.
How to delete your Spotify account
There are other streaming services worth looking into
You can delete your Spotify account if you no longer want it, or if you’ve found a better streaming solution. It is worth noting, though, that you can downgrade from “Premium” to a free account, so if cost is the issue, then we’d recommend considering that first.
Why you should try Tidal over Spotify or Apple Music
If you want a music service that combines a vast library with fair pay for artists and top-notch audio quality, Tidal is it.
If you’re set on deleting your Spotify account, then follow these steps:
If this doesn’t work, then you can also try this method:
