topic Re: Local Files Covers Not Loading On Collab Playlist in iOS (iPhone, iPad)

Local Files Covers Not Loading On Collab Playlist

Spyro08111 — Wed, 29 Jul 2026 03:19:58 GMT

Plan

Premium

Country

Device

iPhone 17 Pro

Operating System

iOS 26

My Question or Issue

I noticed that custom cover art for local files does not load on mobile when it's a collab playlist, this started happening recently after an update that puts the pfp in front of the cover. It works in the actual player and even after removing the collaborator it doesn't show the cover art here. It only does this on mobile. Not a huge deal, but still would like to know if it's just me.

Re: Local Files Covers Not Loading On Collab Playlist

Dessi — Wed, 29 Jul 2026 11:56:43 GMT

Hey @Spyro08111,

Thanks for reaching out and welcome to the Spotify Community.

Just to make sure that we're on the same page - does the same thing happen with playlists that aren't collaborative? What about a brand new playlist? After you create it, try adding the local files and then a collaborator to see if that makes a difference. This will help us check if this is related to the playlist itself or the cover art.

Here are some points worth mentioning when it comes to local files cover art:

Spotify doesn't support .mp4 files containing video, or the iTunes M4A lossless format.
The cover art image can't exceed 300x300 px. Larger images are the most common reason album art fails to appear on local files.

We recommend that you make sure that everything's as it should be as per the points above. You can also try disabling local files, restarting your device and then enabling them again. If needed, the steps describing the process can be found here.

Let us know how it goes.

Re: Local Files Covers Not Loading On Collab Playlist

Spyro08111 — Thu, 30 Jul 2026 03:27:20 GMT

When it’s a normal playlist it works fine and when it’s a collab playlist and only I added songs it’s fine as well, the problem comes from when 2 or more people have added tracks to the playlist, which then makes it show the profile picture of the user who had added it, it used to work fine because the profile picture wasn’t on the cover art, but this just got updated And now this happens. Also, it works just fine on desktop even if it’s a collab playlist.

I didn’t need the other user on the playlist as a collaborator since it was just an alternate account. So I got rid of that account (as a collaborator) and all of the songs that it had added and it fixed itself. Although I could see this being a problem for others with actual collaborators.

Re: Local Files Covers Not Loading On Collab Playlist

Vasil — Thu, 30 Jul 2026 17:44:59 GMT

Hey again @Spyro08111,

Thanks for the additional info!
Just to make sure we have all the details, could you confirm if this happens only with local files and not to songs uploaded to Spotify? We'd also like to know if this happens to all local files or only to some of them & if the affected ones vary in any way with time.

Many thanks! We'll be on the lookout 🙂

Re: Local Files Covers Not Loading On Collab Playlist

Spyro08111 — Thu, 30 Jul 2026 17:50:23 GMT

if you mean songs uploaded to Spotify as in actual artists uploading music then no, it only happens with local files, the local file shown is taking the metadata (Cover, title, artist, etc) from the mp3 that i added and putting it into spotify, and when it adds the profile picture (when its a collab playlist) it breaks in the playlist view.

Re: Local Files Covers Not Loading On Collab Playlist

Vasil — Fri, 31 Jul 2026 15:27:27 GMT

Hey again @Spyro08111,

Thanks for the prompt response.

We did some further digging and it seems that this issue might be a by-product of this one we have under investigation here.
I'd recommend subscribing to that thread to stay on top of any new info and to keep your app updated at all times.

Let us know if there's any change on your end and we'll do the same. Many thanks!