Spotify has a new sleek look, check it out

Spotify has just announced that it will be revamping the look of its popular media streaming app. The new design is aimed at easing users’ experience when trying to find new content to listen to — and watch. The company has doubled down on aesthetics and vertical scrolling, turning your homescreen from a set of album covers into a feed that much more closely resembles social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram. As you scroll, Spotify is also hoping to make it easier to discover new things across the Spotify ecosystem.

Spotify is the biggest player in music streaming and that’s what the new design really shows: that Spotify is no longer a music app and shouldn’t look like one.

Announced at the company’s Stream On event, it is clear evidence of the kind of company (and product) Spotify wants to be. Over the last few years, it has invested in more than just music, expanding its product portfolio into podcasts, audiobooks, and live audio. The company also wants to be a home for creators and is now targeting the likes of YouTube.

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Going forward, when you open Spotify, you’ll still see a bunch of album and playlist covers at the top. But underneath, you might see an auto-playing video podcast, which you can jump into with a tap. Or you might see a big, Instagram-style photo meant to tell you a little more about a playlist you might like.

At the top, if you tap on “Music” or “Podcasts & Shows,” you’ll be taken into a vertically scrolling feed that looks a lot more like Instagram Stories or TikTok than the Spotify you’re used to, dedicated to just that section of Spotify. You can flip through as many as you like, each one auto-playing to give you a sense of what it is, or tap on one to dive in and save or explore it further. 

There’s an obvious tension in the design, between Spotify wanting to make the app a calmer and more navigable space while also trying to find new ways to entice people into new things. There’s more auto-playing content than ever in the app now and lots of ways to quickly preview songs and playlists without hitting fully diving in. Full-screen vertical scrolling is everywhere now and is an obviously useful tool for discovery. Billions of users are used to swiping through a dozen things they don’t like before landing on one they do. And in this new look, every song or playlist or podcast gets a momentary extra chance to grab you. 

Playlists have been Spotify’s main — and, for all intents and purposes, only — source of discovery, but in the new design, there’s a much greater emphasis on getting you into new things. That makes particular sense in podcasts, where Spotify desperately needs to find ways to recoup its huge investments in the space.

The other new thing you may notice in Spotify is more personalized AI. The Smart Shuffle feature, which temporarily adds tracks to your existing playlists, is supposedly an improvement on the “just for you playlist” idea Spotify has been working on for years — and don’t forget DJ, the AI spinning records and hosting your own personal radio show.