We’ve almost given up hope that Spotify will ever deliver the suite of audio upgrades it’s bandied about for years. Rather than talk about the rumoured hi-res or lossless audio features, Spotify has instead announced a range of new features for both Premium and free users, some of which are still experimental.
The idea is to offer all of its customers new and better ways to discover and listen to their music. “Our latest updates give you even more tools to curate playlists, refine your recommendations, and shape your music journey,” it said. Whether it’ll actually deliver on that promise remains to be seen.
Thinking about going Premium?
Up first for Premium users is the new and improved queue, located via the three lines at the bottom of the ‘Now Playing’ screen, which is now “easier to use,” and offers all the controls you’d typically want there, like Shuffle, Smart Shuffle, Repeat, and Sleep Timer.
While we don’t entirely agree that Smart Shuffle is a necessary feature anywhere, Premium users will finally be able to see what songs Spotify has in store for them once their queue starts coming to an end and what’s more, actively shape the queue’s Autoplay future. You can, of course, also turn off Autoplay and Smart Shuffle in the settings if you’d prefer to stick with your own music.
Easily the biggest improvement, again reserved for Premium users, is the revitalised ‘Hide’ button, which Spotify reckons is more “intuitive” than before. Hiding a song will now disappear it from a specific playlist across all your devices. Or, if you’d rather take a break from a specific song, you can hit ‘Snooze’, which will give it a 30-day sabbatical.
Now onto the plebs
Free Spotify users, the music streaming overlords haven’t forgotten about you. All users will soon see new tools that’ll help you keep your hundreds of playlists in check. This involves the introduction of new Add, Sort, and Edit buttons at the top of any given playlist, allowing for quicker ways to rearrange the order, build the playlist, or edit the cover page.
Perhaps the best feature is one that isn’t widely available yet, though listeners in South Africa, Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, the UK, and the US will have immediate access to it. If your ‘Liked songs’ is getting a bit too messy, Spotify now allows users to automatically generate new playlists at the tap of a button. Users will have to put up with sorting by genre to generate these, however.
Oh, and if you’re looking for the Library tab on mobile, you’ll now find it as the third option at the bottom of your app.
