Spotify Tests New “Social Listening” Feature

Spotify wants the music listening experience to become more social. A new feature the company is testing out (only employees have access so far) called Social Listening allows multiple users to create a collaborative playlist, listen to, and control music in real time.

The news was first reported by Jane Wong, who shared screenshots of the various of the menus in the process. Users will be able to see how many people are currently listening, and anyone can add music to the queue.

Spotify is working on Social Listening, letting friends to control music together with their own devices

Scan Spotify Code or open link for it to begin

For example, I'm listening Spotify right now. Feel free to introduce me new music: https://t.co/f59D0sis7Y pic.twitter.com/nPOlcPwQdG

— Jane Manchun Wong (@wongmjane) May 31, 2019

The link to control my music will only work for those with access to Social Listening, meaning only Spotify employees for now

For those at Spotify, feel free to go wild

— Jane Manchun Wong (@wongmjane) May 31, 2019

When connected to Spotify’s Social Listening, you will show up on the “Already connected” list

The “Now Playing” UI will show the amount of friends listening

(friend’s identity here replaced with mine for privacy) pic.twitter.com/Fo5rdH3xGO

— Jane Manchun Wong (@wongmjane) May 31, 2019

Spotify’s Social Listening will also be available for web

This is how the invitation prompt looks like in the Web Player pic.twitter.com/bCEcD3GkOd

— Jane Manchun Wong (@wongmjane) June 1, 2019

And for those wondering, like I was, about how this feature differs from the already existing collaborative playlist feature, Wong responded that it’s “more real time.” The existing feature allows any approved user to add to the playlist, and anyone can listen to any song at any time, simultaneously or otherwise. This new feature focuses more on real time experiences, much like turntable.fm before it was shut down.