There are people who use Spotify and then there are people who love Spotify. Whether you're the casual listener or the person who creates a playlist for every car ride, you can always gain to learn some tips and tricks to make your Spotify experience more pleasant and efficient. Remember, the perfectly curated playlist can add structure to your day, function as welcome bout of procrastination or spur on a boost of creativity. So read up on these tips and tricks to get the most out of your next listening session.
Keep Your Guilty Pleasures On The Down-Lo
Do you low-key listen to Britney's Spear's "I'm Not a Girl, Not Yet a Woman" when you're at a crossroads in your life? If you'd rather not have all of your Facebook friends know that you're listening to some 90s tunes for self-affirmation, there's an easy solution for you. Just go to your settings and click "Private Session" when you want your listening activity to be private for a particular amount of time. If you want to permanently stop sharing your cool musical preferences with the world, go to the preferences section on the Spotify desktop menu. Then uncheck the "Share my activity and what I listen to with my followers on Spotify" and "Share my activity and what I listen to on Facebook" option.
Take Advantage Of Spotify's Curated Playlists
There's plenty of ways to find new music, but one way that is seriously underrated is listening to Spotify's own curated playlists. If you go to the "Browse" tab you can scroll through a variety of curated lists. Some of my favorites include the "New Music Tuesday" playlist, which is filled with new songs from a variety of genres. Also, the weekly "#ThrowBackThursday" playlist has a special place in my heart for reintroducing JoJo back into my life.
Add Songs That Aren't Available On Spotify And Listen To Them Offline
It would be very convenient to have all your music in one handy app, but alas, Spotify's musical selection isn't all encompassing. From The Beatles to Taylor Swift, there are definitely some holes in Spotify's musical offerings. Luckily, there is an easy way around this. Simply go to Preferences and click "enable showing tracks from local sources." Then, if you have a playlist filled with non-Spotify songs you can click the "Available Offline" button at the upper right-hand corner of the playlist screen so you can listen to those songs offline on your phone.
Make Collaborative Group Playlists With Your Friends
Just right-click on the playlist you want to share with your friends and click "Collaborative Playlist." This is especially handy when you're creating a party playlist and want guests to add their own suggestions to the playlist ahead of time. It's worth noting that you can only collaborate playlists on the desktop version.
Link To A Particular Part Of A Song
Speaking of sharing music, if you want to send your friend a certain section of a song (say, for instance, Nicki Minaj's part in "Monster") you can have the song start at a particular point. Just right-click the song and click "Copy Spotify URL." After you paste the URL add the # symbol and the timestamp you'd like the song to start on.
Recover An Accidentally Deleted Playlist
If you're the type of person who takes their playlists seriously, accidentally deleting a masterful collection of songs can be devastating. Luckily, there's a way to recover them. If you go on Spotify's website and log on to your account you will see a "Recover Playlists" tab at the top of the page. This will bring your lost playlist back to life.
Play Your Favorite Part Of A Song Over and Over Again
Whether you're getting ready for a job interview or for "da club", there are times that you need some music to pump up. Music Machinery's Paul Lamere has created a Spotify plugin that lets you do exactly that. The Where Is The Drama plugin takes you exactly to the most climatic part of any song.
Become A Pro At Searching For Music
When you want to listen to music from a specific point in an artist's career, using key modifiers can help. For instance, say you want to listen to Radiohead but only music from their pre-Kid A days. You can easily do this by typing Artist:Radiohead Year:1993-1997 in the search bar. Check out The Definitive Music Search Engine Guide for more helpful modifiers.
Use Your Smartphone As Your Remote
When you're cooking in the kitchen and your laptop is out of reach or the bond between Man and Couch becomes simply too strong for you to break, there's an easy fix. Premium users can use their phone to control what's playing on their laptop or desktop. Simply play a song on your phone and hit the "Connect" button from the "Now Playing" bar. Select your computer from the drop down list and control away.
Add a Snazzy Visualizer
Just type in "spotify:app:visualizer" in your search bar to get a full audio-visual experience.
Read The Song Lyrics To Every Song In Real Time
Turn any moment into an instant Karaoke session by downloading the free Tune Wiki app from Spotify's App finder. Then, whenever you're playing a song just click Tune Wiki in the sidebar to have the lyrics start scrolling on your screen.
Create Crossfades Between Songs
Sometimes you're having a moment and want to create the perfect, seamless musical experience. You can easily do this by adding crossfades between your songs. Just go to your preferences screen, go to the "Playback" section and check the "Crossfade tracks" button. You can adjust how long you want the transition to be through a sliding button.
