Spotify Downplays HomePod Support, But Promises to Add AirPlay 2 Yet Again

[Richu]

Spotify on HomePod is the biggest missing feature. I’m not willing to buy an Apple Music subscription for just one device so I AirPlay Spotify to HomePod. Unfortunately, there is a lengthy delay.

This is probably why Spotify doesn’t implement it. It must be purely business reasons. The technical aspect is easy.

The reasoning one can only speculate . I’m guessing they don’t want to create more room for hardware manufacturers to control consumers than necessary. Just like why Google Stadia failed.

 

[Born Again]

Imagine being petty at the cost of customer satisfaction? What a stupid company lol glad I use Apple Music.

So you’re happy using an inferior product because of the 12 people who use HomePods which you may or may not even own? Okay

 

[iBreatheApple]

Dear Spotify,

*

Respectfully,
iBreatheApple

 

[kiken]

They’ve added support for all the other smart speakers. This is an anti-competitive behaviour of Spotify’s side. Appl should sue.

 

[rsnhakan]

I was using Spotify for years. Last year I cancelled my subscription because of two reasons: they make false promises and underpaying artists.

Using Apple Music for a few months right now and yes the UI is not as good as Tidal for example or Spotify, but other than that it's amazing.

 

[koil]

It's literally the 9th most requested feature on their community...

Also, to throw more coal on the embers, there were rumors about the actual reason why Spotify won't implement this. They want the raw voice data from the speaker so that they can do emotional analysis on it before deciding on what music to play. Something I ABSOLUTELY do not want, so I'm very happy the HomePod can't provide this to them.

 

[koil]

Spotify is brutal

Years after the fact, STILL no hopepod native support and STILL no native apple watch support


Pathetic

Native Apple Watch support has existed for a few years now.

 

[TsMkLg068426]

I remember when Spotify was at the top for streaming music and went through legal lawsuits but now with competition they just do not care. Didn't Microsoft buy Spotify?

 

[chrisone]

noting that Spotify told him there hasn't been a "significant volume" of complaints about the lack of HomePod support

Because most people have completely given up on Spotify’s ability to deliver on anything (HomePod, AirPlay 2, HiFi) and just stay with the company because of Discover Weekly and it’s music discovery algorithms…

 

[Hashp]

Spotify, Fortnite .. all snowflakes

 

[TehFalcon]

Never liked Spotify, Apple has way more experience in the Music game. Apple Music is based off iTunes after all. Can't beat having a native built in app that just works. Ai looks interesting in Spotify but thats about it, something Apple will implement in the future with how things are going, too many downsides to Spotify for me to care about it.

 

[sleeptodream]

Genuine question, what is everyone's gripe with the Apple Music UI? Like specifics. What makes it an unenjoyable experience for you?

I don’t understand those complaints either. Apple Music runs smooth as heck on my 13 Pro. The UI is way cleaner and more intuitive than Spotify’s

It also works better with the way my brain is wired to find music having grown up with iPods: Artist>Album>Song, or Playlist>Play/Shuffle, simple and clean. I don’t have to be *following* an artist for them to show up in my list of artists. Like what’s that about?

Idk it seems like cluttered UIs are becoming more popular with the younger gens. Just look at Discord as another example. This is coming from a young-ish millennial who was raised on tech lol

Like the Spotify now playing screen has 13 icons… Why even have the three dot menu? The lyrics are always peaking up which adds to the clutter. And don’t get me started on the share icon directly above the lyric share icon 🙄 they don’t even match…

 

[Steeley]

For me, I was toying with the idea of switching back to Apple Music after getting sick of seeing podcasts and books in my music app. But what pushed me over the line was one day opening up Spotify on CarPlay and it displaying all my playlists under date listings and I couldn’t change it. Now I’ve tasted the better integration and higher audio quality I’m never going back. Doubly so if they stick to that tik tok feed nonsense they’re trialling.

 

[Baumi]

Imagine being petty at the cost of customer satisfaction? What a stupid company lol glad I use Apple Music.

My guess would be that it isn’t as much pettiness as it is a mixture of politics and economics:

The initial complaint was likely less about them needing to be on the HomePod and more about trying to hamper Apple‘s efforts with Apple Music by any means available. (As a bonus, making yourself out to be the “open” alternative to a walled garden is good marketing.)
In the years since that complaint, consumer spending has slowed down, though, and even before that, Spotify’s growth started to slow and new ventures like their foray into podcasting have so far not been profitable. So, they might well have run the numbers and decided actually following through on their HomePod/AirPlay2 talk wound not be worth it.

That’s not meant to defend the decision from a consumer’s POV - their lack of support made me switch to Apple Music. It’s just that sometimes companies may decide, rightly or wrongly, that it’s more economical to lose some customers’ business than to spend the money it’d take to retain it.

 

[wbeasley]

Now Tesla has an Apple Music app there's one less reason to stay with Spotify.
Too long with promises that never get delivered. HiFi content... hahaha joke

 

[SanderEvers]

I stopped using Spotify when they started blaming Apple for everything. And I absolutely have 0 intention of ever switching back to it. I am a very happy Apple Music user now.

 

[hagar]

Holy smokes...someone forgot to send me that memo so I can be reflexively outraged. I've been using Siri to play Apple Music, without issue, on all of the HomePods in my house for around 4-5 years.

Great for you! But when I ask Siri to play a specific song she turns on the lights in the bedroom.

 

[MacFan23]

It appears to be working since Spotify’s growth continues to outpace Apple Music’s, based on the last update I read anyway. Their AI is just better, the way it introduces you to new music. And the interface is light years ahead, they’re still never made Apple Music make any sense. It’s kinda ridiculous…

I've never understood this complaint.

It's 5 tabs.

Listen Now for personalised suggestions
Browse for Apple curated suggestions
Radio for the radio
Library for your library
Search to search

What's complicated about that?

 

[geartau]

And I am in no way in the minority.

need some data to back that up, otherwise that's just an assumption, not a fact.

 

[pauloregan]

Apple will have linked third party access to their App store billing system I suspect.

 

[mdriftmeyer]

The fact that Spotify dominates a category where they are competing with Amazon, Google and Apple just goes to show what a great product it is.

Not surprised they don't think Homepod is worth the engineering time.

You don't dominate a market category when your EPS and P/E ratios are negative and NaN.

Spotify is not a healthy company, financially speaking.

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[deevey]

I’m assuming (or actually hoping, I guess) that by that third complaint, you meant how little they pay artists! 🙁

yes

 

[techfreak23]

It doesn’t have anything to do with their stance on Apple’s practices. Stop trying to stir up the drama. That’s just their crappy development cycles. It’s always been like that. It took them years to release an iPad version and over 2 years after the Apple Watch released for that version. They also used to be terrible at feature parity across all platforms. Connect came out on iOS before it was released on desktop. It took them months, almost a year, to add it to every version. Now that it’s everywhere, it’s what makes Spotify sooooo much better than Apple Music and AirPlay 2. Connect is leaps and bounds better. I don’t even need to be on the same WiFi network to control playback on any of the devices signed into my account. They just show up.

 

[techfreak23]

Spotify is brutal

Years after the fact, STILL no hopepod native support and STILL no native apple watch support


Pathetic

You do realize they came out with a native watch app like 3 years ago, right…?

What’s pathetic is their development cycle. They didn’t even update their app for the new screen sizes for months after iPhone 5 came out. Years for both the iPad and Watch versions.

 

[techfreak23]

I loved Spotify but I ultimately switched to Apple Music because they took way too long to properly support the Apple Watch back in the day. They literally said that they didn't think people wanted to run without their phone SMDH. Always complaining... never delivering.

They hemorrhage money. I think it’s more that they don’t have the money for faster development cycles rather than lack of interest in features. I still will not switch though unless Apple or any of the others come out with a Connect like feature. AirPlay is trash.