There’s a lot of competition when it comes to music streaming services. I’ve tried Deezer, Google Play Music, YouTube Music, and Spotify. But Spotify is the service that I’ve subscribed to for the past few years and these are the features and reasons that keep me coming back.
1 Generated Playlists
Spotify doesn’t only recommend pre-existing playlists created by the platform and other users, but it also provides daily and weekly mixes, as well as a Release Radar playlist—all of which are catered to your tastes.
This is a great way to discover new music and keep up with your favorite artists. The fact that you also get multiple mixes to choose from also helps when you’re in the mood for a particular genre or artist.
2 Podcasts
While I use Spotify mainly for music, the large collection of podcasts also keeps me using the app. While I used to use Google Podcasts for listening to podcasts, the app had technical issues which affected playback. Since I was already using Spotify for music, I added all my favorite podcasts to the app as well.
So far, I haven’t found any podcasts that I listened to that aren’t on Spotify. The platform also has some exclusive podcasts, which may appeal to other users.
Since episodes from certain podcasts are already packed with sponsorships, cross-promotion, and ads, having a subscription to Spotify means that I don’t have to deal with even more ads on top of that.
3 Seamless Device Switching
Spotify Connect lets you link different devices to your account and switch between them quickly and easily, while also allowing you to control playback from a separate device. I often switch from playback on my phone to the web browser when I sit down to do some work or play games. While I’m doing chores, I play Spotify on my TV or smart speaker while controlling playback on my phone.
You don’t even have to pause when switching between devices. To access your connected devices, tap the speaker, laptop, or phone icon in the bottom toolbar on Spotify and select which device you want to use.
4 Song Lyrics on the Website and Mobile App
While this is a relatively small feature, the fact that Spotify allows you to display lyrics while listening to a song is a major draw for me. YouTube Music has a lyrics feature, but it is limited to the mobile app for Android and iOS and was introduced later than Spotify’s feature.
Lyrics on Spotify are available on the mobile apps, as well as the browser version. You can access the lyrics feature by scrolling down when listening to a song on mobile. On the web player, you can click on the microphone icon.
5 Blocking Artists You Don’t Want to Listen To
While Spotify would benefit from a dislike option for songs, it does allow you to block certain artists so that they don’t show up in your recommendations. Whatever your reason for blocking an artist, it’s a great feature to have—especially if the artist would usually fall into your taste profile.
The main limitation is that to block an artist on Spotify you need to use the mobile app. Visit the artist’s profile, select the three dots icon, and select Don’t play this artist. Spotify will not play the artist’s songs, even if they appear in pre-existing playlists.
6 Downloading Audio to Listen to Later
This is one of the features that makes Spotify Premium worth the subscription. Spotify allows you to download playlists, music, and podcast episodes to listen to when you’re offline. This is useful when you want to listen to Spotify in your car instead of the radio, as well as when you want to listen to podcasts on flights.
If you want to download a playlist on Spotify’s mobile app, you need to open the playlist and then select the downward facing arrow to download it. When it comes to podcasts, open the episode you want to download and use the same downward facing arrow to download the episode.
If you want to view your downloads, go to your library, swipe on the labels under Your Library and select Downloaded. This will show you your downloaded playlists and podcast episodes.
7 Spotify Wrapped
While Spotify Wrapped only arrives once a year, it’s a great feature that lets you reminisce over your favorite artists and songs of the year. Every year, Spotify also adds a few new tools to add some novelty to the experience.
When you are among the top listeners of certain artists, you also get to see an exclusive video from them that thanks fans.
If you want to revisit Spotify Wrapped playlists from previous years, you are able to. You can search for “your top songs” on Spotify and use the Playlists filter to find your old Wrapped playlists. Just make sure to select the ones made by Spotify to see your own personalized playlist.
While Spotify is by no means a perfect streaming service, its features keep me coming back to the platform and investing in its Premium subscription.
