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Tag: spotify

  • Spotify promises to completely overhaul its Wear app

    Spotify promises to completely overhaul its Wear app

    Google announced this week it has teamed up with Samsung to revamp Wear OS. Along with the complete redesign of its wearable platform, Google promised to bring even more of its apps to Wear and update those that are already available.

    Due to the radical changes that Wear will be going through in the coming weeks, third-party apps like Spotify will be updated too. The good news is the Spotify app for Wear will also get a handful of new features, not just some much-needed visual changes.

    During Google I/O’s keynote, Spotify confirmed that it’s working on the option to download music and podcasts directly to your Wear smartwatch, which will allow users to leave their phones home they’re going for a run.

    Up until now, the Spotify app for Wear only allows users to control music played on other devices. The upcoming update will allow users to control playback from their Wear smartwatches if Spotify is playing on other devices, such as PC, smartphone, or smart speaker.

    Although we don’t know when exactly the new Spotify app will roll out to Wear smartwatch users, we doubt that will happen before Google releases the new version of its wearable platform later this year.

  • Yet another streaming service beats Spotify to the Apple Watch offline listening punch

    Yet another streaming service beats Spotify to the Apple Watch offline listening punch

    Apple, Amazon, and even Google’s music streaming platforms have been in the limelight of late for a couple of different reasons, and now it’s Deezer’s turn to make headlines as it (ineffectively) tries to keep up with the world heavyweight champion of the thriving industry.

    Unfortunately for audiophiles, the French service, which is mainly popular on the old continent and less so stateside, is not ready for an Apple and Amazon Music-rivaling discount of its existing HiFi tier… just yet.

    While you still need to pay $19.95 a month (in the US) to access a library of around 36 million tracks in FLAC quality, the latest killer feature added to Deezer’s Spotify-challenging arsenal is available completely free of charge… for “premium” subscribers.

    We’re talking about offline listening functionality delivered straight to your wrist by the Apple Watch Series 6, and in case that doesn’t sound like such a big deal, you may want to know the world’s most popular smartwatch is actually not in the same boat as far as Spotify integration is concerned.

    Of course, Deezer is not breaking entirely new ground here either, following in the footsteps of Apple Music (duh) and Pandora while beating the likes of YouTube Music and Tidal in addition to Spotify to the offline punch (the latter of which doesn’t even have an official Apple Watch app to begin with).

    As long as you own the newest high-end edition of the immensely successful Apple Watch and are already paying Deezer for a Premium, Student, Family, or HiFi subscription, it should be extremely easy to start using the feature.

    All you have to do is choose the playlist you want to download to your intelligent timepiece, and depending on its amount of free storage space, you can then listen to your favorite tunes on the fly without keeping your iPhone nearby or staying connected to the internet.

    The Apple Watch Deezer app was obviously already capable of controlling your iPhone’s music streaming action, and on top of everything else, each member of a paid Family account can now download playlists and favorites from their own individual profiles.

    In case you’re wondering, Deezer also allows offline listening on select Tizen-powered Samsung Galaxy Watches while lacking the functionality on Google’s Wear OS platform, which could well change in the very near future.

  • Spotify updates Android and iPhone apps to improve accessibility

    Spotify updates Android and iPhone apps to improve accessibility

    With 365 million users around the world, Spotify is now one of the biggest music streaming services. Such a title always comes with certain responsibilities, especially when it comes to accessibility.

    Spotify introduced many changes to improve the experience of its users while they’re enjoying their favorite songs and podcasts. The most recent updates for Spotify on iOS and Android introduce three accessibility improvements to the user experience: buttons with increased readability features, options for text resizing, and a beta for podcast transcripts.

    Once the update makes it to your phone, you should notice changes to buttons in terms of color, text formatting, and size. These are meant to make it easier for low-vision and visually impaired users to take advantage of various features like shuffling playlists or start listening to a session. Moreover, the update will also help users in situations where there’s low lighting or high screen reflections.

    The next major change introduced today is the option to resize Spotify’s text inside Android and iOS apps. This can be done from the Settings menu on your iPhone:

    • On your phone, head to Settings > Accessibility, then select “Display & Text Size.”
    • Tap “Larger Text” for larger font options.
    • Drag the slider to select the font size you want.

    Last but not least, Spotify is rolling out auto-generated podcast transcripts, which will automatically generate transcripts for Spotify Original and Exclusive podcasts across iOS and Android. The new feature will make it easier for users to read text of the specific podcasts on their phones either with or without sound.

  • Apple Music plans on challenging Spotify

    Apple Music plans on challenging Spotify

    Last week, Spotify announced that during the first quarter of this year, the number of its paid subscribers rose 21% to 158 million. During that quarter, Spotify HiFi was unveiled which will give subscribers the option to listen to lossless streaming music in select markets later this year. Spotify says that the feature will allow subscribers to “listen to their favorite songs the way artists intended,” and that this is “consistently one of the most requested new features.”

    Apple recently released iOS 14.6 developer beta 1. Code found in the release mentioned things like “Dolby Atmos,” “Dolby Audio,” and “Lossless.” The references do not appear in iOS 14.5 and in iOS 14.6 beta 2 which means that Apple could be trying to make this a secret.

    Besides Spotify, whose high-quality stream will be available later this year, Amazon Music HD offers a higher-quality stream at 320kbps for $14.99 a month ($12.99 for Prime members), $5 more a month than its standard plan. Tidal has a lossless service priced at $19.99 monthly that streams at 1,411 Kbps.

    Apple could introduce the lossless streaming tier for Apple Music during virtual WWDC 2021 which is scheduled to kick off on June 7th. Additionally, some believe that Apple will announce the new Apple Music tier at the same time that it introduces new AirPods which might include the AirPods 3, the AirPods Pro 2 and two other possible models. However, TF International analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said back in March that the third-generation “earable” won’t see the light of day until the third quarter (July-September) of this year.

    Speaking of AirPods, if you can’t wait for the next generation models to launch, check out the best sales and deals on the most popular TWS earbuds in the world.

  • Spotify announces paid subscription platform

    Spotify announces paid subscription platform

    Last week we reported on Spotify’s intentions to release an alternative to Apple’s paid podcast subscriptions. Now, the platform is real and soon you’ll be able to pay extra for extra podcast content.

    Apple got on this wagon first, but the offer from Cupertino is far from practical for podcasters. Tim Cook and company will take a 30% commission for the first year, and 15% for the second, in addition to the $20 annual fee for membership. While this is fine for big organizations, small creators may struggle to make money from the scheme.

    Spotify’s offer flips Apple’s business model on its head. It won’t take a cut from creators – at least for the first two years. This excludes transaction fees. After the first two years of the partnership, Spotify gives a word to take only five percent of the revenue.

    The program will be accessible and available through Anchor (app & website). Anchor is the podcast production platform that was acquired by Spotify about two years ago. It allows you to take your podcast from an idea to a finished product, all with just a smartphone.

    Now it will also allow creators to share exclusive content for subscribers. This can in the form of a brand new episode or early access. If you aren’t hosting your podcast on Anchor, don’t worry – Spotify promises to open up the platform for those who host their podcasts elsewhere. More details will be available soon.

    So, what about listeners? The way you’ll be able to recognize paid content is by the lock icon next to the episode (if you aren’t subscribed). This content will still be discoverable, similar to any other podcast episode, and it’ll appear on the feed. From what we understand, the only way to start your subscription is to click on a link found on the show notes on Spotify or head directly to the podcast page on Anchor and sign up.All of this will let you support your favorite podcasters, making sure the money goes directly to them. Then, Spotify promises to “maximize (creators) subscription audience and grow it from their existing listener base”.

    Spotify is going to support independent podcasters to get started with the subscription platform. NPR is on board with some ad-free content for paid subscribers. How I Built This with Guy Raz, Short Wave, It’s Been a Minute with Sam Sanders, Code Switch, and Planet Money will be available as soon as May 4.

    On the other hand, Apple’s version is expected to debut in May too. The tech giant hasn’t announced any exclusive shows or content just yet, but seems to have an advantage when it comes to global availability, as its platform will be available in 170 countries. Spotify’s offer will be available only in the US for now. Plans for global expansion are already on the table, but they’ll take a few months.

    For listeners, you should bear in mind that Spotify recently increased some of the Premium prices for a few regions of the world. Spotify family is increasing from $14.99 to $15.99 per month in the US. The rest of the Premium offers remain untouched as of today.

    However, UK-based users aren’t so fortunate. Spotify Student goes from £4.99 to £5.99 per month, Duo subscription from £12.99 to £13.99 a month, and Spotify Family plan (six accounts) goes from £14.99 to £16.99 a month.

    Ireland and a bunch of countries in Europe are also part of the price increase. Student Premium goes up by €4.99 to €5.99, and Due goes up from €11.99 to €12.99. The Family plan in Europe goes up from €14.99 to €17.99 per month. Countries in Asia and South America will also be affected.

    The changes come into effect on April 30. All existing Spotify subscribers in the US, Europe, and UK users of Spotify will have a one-month grace period before prices are automatically increased, meaning if you are already subscribed, the new prices will affect you from June, not May.

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  • Facebook set to announce new audio products – Recode

    Facebook set to announce new audio products – Recode

    Facebook will announce a series of products under the umbrella of “social audio” on Monday, including its take on audio-chat app Clubhouse and a push into podcast discovery and distribution, Recode reported on Sunday.

    These plans include an audio version of Rooms, a video-conferencing product Facebook launched a year ago. The Clubhouse-like product will let groups of people listen to and interact with speakers on a virtual “stage”.

    Facebook will also launch a product allowing its users to record brief voice messages and post them in their newsfeeds, and a podcast discovery product that will be connected with Spotify, according to the report, which cited sources.

    The announcement will be made on Monday but some products will not show up for a while, the report added.

    A Facebook spokeswoman declined to comment. Spotify did not immediately respond to a request for comment on

    Facebook started public testing of a new application dubbed Hotline earlier this month, where creators can speak and take live questions from an audience.

    This Q&A product combines audio with text and video elements and comes as social media platforms experiment with a rush of new live audio features.

    The success of the invite-only, year-old app Clubhouse, which has reported 10 million weekly active users, has demonstrated the potential of audio chat services, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic.

    Twitter has been testing its audio feature Spaces and Facebook is also dabbling with a live audio room offering within its Messenger Rooms.

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  • The EU comes after Apple with list of antitrust charges

    The EU comes after Apple with list of antitrust charges

    Apple is taking hit after hit in its continued struggle against antitrust accusations, as only last week Arizona passed a bill forcing the App Store to allow third-party payment systems within apps to circumvent the 30% commission fee.

    Reuters has revealed that EU antitrust regulators are currently finalizing a list of charges against Apple for violating antitrust laws. Apparently, Spotify, the Swedish music streaming service, had jumpstarted a set of four cases against Apple when it filed a report against the tech giant two years ago.

    Spotify had initially complained to the European Commission that Apple was giving an unfair advantage to Apple Music by restricting alternative platforms to keep them in its shadow. This has since galvanized further complaints against Apple’s 30% commission fee imposed on all apps without allowing alternative payment systems or other app stores onto the iOS.

    If Apple loses to these charges, it could spell the end of its App Store monopoly. In the US, Apple is waiting to go on trial in only two months to face Epic Games in a lawsuit for antitrust practices, which was launched last August. It looks like a freer mobile app publishing platform may loom on the horizon after all, which would be fortunate for smaller developers and businesses who have been impacted the most by this monopoly.

    Reuters states that the document listing the charges is set to be delivered to Apple sometime before this summer.

  • Spotify announces HiFi subscription tier, coming to Premium users later this year

    Spotify announces HiFi subscription tier, coming to Premium users later this year

    Spotify is bringing new benefits to users who pay for a monthly subscription. Starting later this year, Spotify HiFi will be available to all Premium subscribers who wish to upgrade, regardless of what platform they use to listen to their favorite music.

    Unfortunately, Spotify HiFi will only be available in select markets, at least at launch. Also, it will not be available for free, although no price has been announced yet. We’ll come back to this when Spotify reveals the launch date and price for its new HiFi subscription tier.

    For now, let’s talk about what Spotify HiFi means. Well, just like Tidal’s HiFi service, this is all about sound quality. Spotify HiFi promises to offer music in CD-quality, lossless audio format to your device and speakers compatible with the streaming service. If you’re looking for high-quality music streaming, Spotify HiFi seems like a great choice, assuming the price won’t be too high.

    On a side note, Spotify revealed a brand new feature aimed at artists: Spotify Clips. It works like Snapchat’s Stories and allows artists to use playlists to share their stories with fans. The company announced Spotify Clips will debut on Spotify playlists, featuring artists in short videos today.

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  • Amazon Music Unlimited users are getting a surprising new feature

    Amazon Music Unlimited users are getting a surprising new feature

    Amazon has been competing for years against music streaming services like Google Play Music, Spotify, and Apple Music, hence the large number of resources the US giant has been pouring into development.

    Lately, Amazon Music Unlimited has been gaining a lot of new customers to the point that the service is now just 5 million subscribers away from Apple Music, which recently revealed a 60 million subscriber count.

    But Amazon isn’t stopping here, so the next step is yet another important new feature that only Music Unlimited users will benefit from. Starting this week, Amazon Music Unlimited users will have access to a database of music videos they can watch.

    There’s little information about the new feature, although Amazon does mention that “paid subscribers can start with videos from a favorite artist or a video playlist.” At the moment, music videos can only be watched in the United States, and it’s unclear whether or not the feature will be introduced in other countries too.

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  • Spotify’s newest feature finally puts it on par with Apple Music

    Spotify’s newest feature finally puts it on par with Apple Music

    Spotify is the leading music streaming service and the company is continuously trying to improve its platform. Today, it has rolled out a useful new feature to Android and iOS users around the world.

    The feature hasn’t been given an official name but it essentially upgrades in-app search with support for lyrics. Once enabled, Spotify users can search for a song by typing in some of the lyrics.

    That comes in handy when you don’t know the name of the song or artist. It should also reduce the dependence on third-party apps such as SoundHound and Shazam, the latter of which is owned by Apple.

    Speaking of the Tim Cook-led company, this new search feature finally puts Spotify on par with arch-rival Apple Music, which has supported the in-app lyric search for a couple of years now.

    The news comes less than a week after Spotify updated its Collaborative Playlists feature to make it easier to add friends and family members while also introducing user avatars in the playlist header and alongside each song of the episode.
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  • Push notifications for new episodes feature is finally coming to Spotify

    Push notifications for new episodes feature is finally coming to Spotify

    Spotify is now finally adding a crucial feature to its podcasts section, making users finally able to get notifications for upcoming new podcasts they have followed. Now, thanks to a new update, users will be able to benefit from this feature.

    It may seem evident for an app, supporting podcasts, to have notifications available if you would want to never miss a new episode of a show. However, at the launch of Spotify’s podcast section, and even months after that, Spotify did not offer this possibility to its users. In order to compete with the biggest in the podcast business, this is quite the necessary feature.

    Although not everyone would want to get push notifications, there’s a good amount of people that actually want to be among the first to listen to a new podcast episode of someone they like. Now, in order to benefit from this feature, you need to, quite understandably, follow the podcast series you want to get notifications for and then enable the feature.

    This new feature is available for both premium and free users of Spotify. The update is enrolling starting today for mobile devices, so you should be able to get it pretty soon.

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  • Spotify introduces new in-app feature for free and premium users

    Spotify introduces new in-app feature for free and premium users

    Spotify has just taken the wraps off a brand-new feature that will make it easier than ever to share your absolute favorite music and podcasts. Dubbed My Forever Favorites, the new in-app feature lets Spotify users create a playlist with their top five songs and/or podcast episodes, which can be shared on social channels.

    The new feature is rolling out to Android and iOS devices starting today, but it’s also available on desktop in case you’re using Spotify on your computer. If you don’t see My Forever Favorites in your Home hub, you can enter Spotify:forever-favorites in the Spotify app search field.

    To create a new playlist and share it on social channels, you have to follow a few steps:

    • Simply visit the “Home” hub on Spotify and select My Forever Favorites
    • Search and add your favorite tracks and podcasts
    • From there, click the “share” button to easily post on social

    The new My Forever Favorites in-app feature is available worldwide for both free and premium Spotify users, just make sure to follow the steps above to start sharing your favorite tunes and podcasts with your friends.

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  • Spotify launches Group Session feature for Premium users

    Spotify launches Group Session feature for Premium users

    Spotify introduced two weeks ago a special premium plan for couples, which allows two users who reside at the same address to get similar benefits for just $12.99 per month. While the new plan does make sense for a certain category of customers, it’s limited by the fact that both users must have the same address to be eligible for the Spotify Premium Duo plan.

    Spotify announced a new feature that will allow multiple Premium users to share control of their listening sessions with others in real-time. Basically, Spotify Premium users will be able to listen together to their favorite tune, regardless of their location.

    Group Session, as Spotify calls it, enables groups of two to five people to use the feature by sharing a “join” link via messaging apps or social media with each other. Initially released in beta back in May, the new Group Session feature is only available to Premium users and lets both host and guests pause, skip, play, and select tracks in the queue.

    Also, Group Session includes the option to add in choices whenever the host or guests feel like. All changes are made instantaneously, so if you want to change add a new song to the list or skip the current one, these actions will be reflected on all participant devices immediately.

    Spotify Premium users can start taking advantage of the new feature by heading to the Connect menu and tapping on the “Start a group session” option. Then, they will be able to share the invite link they get with their friends or have them scan the Spotify code to join the session.

  • Spotify rolls out video podcasts to free and premium users worldwide

    Spotify rolls out video podcasts to free and premium users worldwide

    Podcasts are a thing for several years now, but they only recently blow up. Spotify and other music streaming services are pushing out lots of features related to podcasts, including the option to see the actual podcasters, while listening to them.

    Spotify revealed that it’s now rolling out a new video podcast feature with select podcasts, which will allow both free and premium users to listen to or watch these podcasts. Spotify also highlighted some of the podcasts that will benefit from video integration: Book of Basketball 2.0, Fantasy Footballers, The Misfits Podcast, H3 Podcast, The Morning Toast, Higher Learning with Van Lathan & Rachel Lindsay, and The Rooster Teeth Podcast.

    Regardless of whether you’re using an Android or iOS device, you can watch podcasts by pressing the play icon that usually appears on compatible podcasts. They should start automatically and sync almost immediately with the audio feed.

    The option to download the audio on your phone so that you can listen to your favorite podcasts on the go will remain available. Keep in mind that the video feature will only roll out in countries where podcasts are supported.

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  • Spotify launches new app for Android TV

    Spotify launches new app for Android TV

    Spotify seems to have launched a new version of its app on Android TV. If you already have the old installed, you might want to check for an update via Google Play Store because you’ll certainly benefit from lots of improvements.

    The entire Spotify app has been redesigned, and that includes background images and the addition of sidebar for navigation. A new UI is now available to Spotify users on Android TV, which contains a couple of tabs that offer access to various features.

    For example, the Home tab now brings up your most recently played albums and playlists, while the Search tab revealed the “Genres & Moods” options that are completely new for the Android TV app. The new app also features multiple sections like Daily Mix, recommended radio stations, and a couple of others depending on your listening tastes.

    All these can be accessed from the sidebar on the left that also includes Your Library and Account tab from where you can make changes to your app or sign out from your account. The album and playlist screens, along with Now Playing did not suffer any changes, so don’t look expect any visual improvements when it comes to these aspects.

    The update is already rolling out to Android TV devices out there, so make sure to head to Google Play Store and check for its availability.