Spotify friends activity empty/not updating

[Tonasj]

Plan

Premium

Country

Finland

Device

Pc

Operating System

Windows 10

My Question or Issue

For several months (pretty much years at this point), my Spotify friends feed has not been updating, it only shows 1 friend I have, while it should have a dozen others. This has been going on for far too long for it to be a problem on my end as I have changed my devices, settings, and other things to try and fix it. I have reinstalled Spotify and my OS but nothing helps. I also see no friends through my Facebook integration even after disconnecting and reconnecting my Facebook profile multiple times. All my settings are the same as my friends and he can see his friend activity but I can't. I already posted about this problem once, and was told it would fix itself but that was months ago. This is very infuriating as it has been going for so long.

[Tonasj]

We have seen the reports of people saying Friend Feed is not working for them, and we are happy to investigate specific cases, because as far as we are aware, there are no issues with Friend Feed working.

Firstly, it’s important to restate that ALL users had “Share my listening activity on Spotify” turned off as default - so users you followed and saw in your Friend Feed in the past, will no longer show in your Friend Feed, UNLESS they turned “Share my listening activity on Spotify” back on. 

Also worth noting that you don’t need Facebook set up for Friend Feed to work.

Having said that, all of the below must be true for users to show in your Friend Feed:

• You must be following the friend whose activity you want to see.
• The friend must have enabled the setting to publish their activity:
• Share my listening activity on Spotify - toggled on.
• The friend must have played more than 30 seconds of a track on iOS, Android or Desktop in the last 7 days.
• This can’t be in a Private Session.
• Also you should both have restarted the App at some point recently.

If all of this is true for you and your friend and they don’t show up in your Friend Feed, then:

• We need you, and the friend you are following, to post here saying you give us permission to check your accounts.
• We need explicit written permission from both of you.
• We can't test this with one person's username and permission.  
• It’s enough to post here, we can find your username based on your Community profile. 

Once we have this we can do some checking. Thanks all.

[jessicag23]

The exact same thing is happening to me after a private session. It’s showing all my friends updates from 2 or 3 days ago except for 1 friend for some reason. I have logged out, deleted and redownloaded the app, and closed and re-opened plenty of times and it’s still the same.

[adrianagaydova]

It is due to the newest update. They have set by default that users' activity won't be shared on the Friends activity bar. The only method is to manually change it from the settings. To be honest, I am quite frustrated with this update as well. No one was notified when this setting was changed.

[Kiril]

Hey everyone,

Thanks for reaching out on the Community! We've moved your posts to a relevant Help Board where they fit better.

We can confirm that the default setting for sharing your listening activity with friends was changed to off with recent releases. This means that those who had it on before without explicitly setting it on, now have it switched off. This would explain why they aren't in your feed any more.

You can let your friends know of this change and ask them to turn it on in their settings if they want to share their listening activity.

Hope this clears things up. If you have any questions or need anything else, the Community is here for you.

[kayleejade_]

Plan

Premium

Country

United States

Device

HP Laptop

Operating System

Windows 10

My Question or Issue

Friend activity is my favorite part of Spotify, but it hasn’t been working for the past few days. It won’t update, though I know for a fact that music is being listened to. Some friends have disappeared altogether and aren’t private. I’ve signed in and out, un and reinstalled, un and refollowed, and nothing has worked. 

[josues2017]

This is happening to me as well. However, I'm on a MacBook Pro - macOS Mojave, with the most recent update of Spotify.

Plan: Free --- Country: United States 

Some friends are updating when they've just listened to a song, while others have gotten stuck in the friend activity "without having listened" for days. After a "week," they just disappear, even though I know they've listened as I can see it on Discord, and know they're not on private mode either. And they don't reappear after listening.

This is happening for a large handful of people on the list, whereas about another half is updating normally; there is a divide in their hearing times, one with 11 hr and the one right underneath as 2 days then 4 days and 6, which I know is not right. 10 friends have been put as having listened "4 days ago."

I've already restarted my device, reinstalled a clean version of Spotify, signed in and out, turned activity on and off, followed and unfollowed, and nothing is working. Please fix whatever bug this might be! Friend activity is one of the best parts of the desktop version!

[ouqhtra2hutc55042key]

This is happening to me too. I am using Spotify Windows (the app), and half of my friends are updating, the others are all showing "4d" or over (these friends have all been listening to Spotify recently). I've already tried re-installing Spotify, turning off and on friend activity, unfollowing and following, and nothing is working.

I hope someone can fix this problem promptly, thank you!

[IllegalMike]

Happening to me as well. So far shows all friends haven't listened to music in the past 4 days. Even though their recently played artists updates in real time on their profile. I did everything the help article said to do and still nothing. 

[itsmeyouness]

It seems that you're not the only one that's facing this problem, i've noticed that too since their last update on 29/11 something there went wrong, i only can see activity of friends who are listening on pc but for those listening on mobile their activity wasn't updated since 4 days now.

[itsmeyouness]

It seems that you're not the only one that's facing this problem, i've noticed that too since their last update on 29/11 something there went wrong, i only can see activity of friends who are listening on pc but for those listening on mobile their activity wasn't updated since 4 days now.

[CarlosE]

Hi @gg996,

Thanks for your reply.

As @Ver mentioned, these settings have been set to off by default. We recently updated the Friend Activity default to private so that users have greater control over how their listening activity is shared with others on Spotify. Users that want to make their listening activity public, can turn sharing on in the Settings menu. If you want to see what your friends are playing, they need to enable that feature on their end as well.

Hope this clears things up. If you have any questions or need anything else, the Community is here for you.

Cheers!

[gg996]

Hi @CarlosE - Unfortunately I think several people are unaware of this new update. I believe Spotify had sent out an email communication, but I know I didn't see it myself as well as folks I know personally. The social features on Spotify were the main reason for me to switch over from Apple Music, but now I'm not sure I see the same value if the default is set to 'off'. It seems like many others also share this sentiment - for example: https://community.spotify.com/t5/Other-Podcasts-Partners-etc/Friend-Activity-not-updating-correctly-.... And I've seen this elsewhere in the Community as well as on Twitter and Reddit. I hope your teams take this feedback into consideration and reverse this!

[malfoyyy]

Hi Kiril,
It still didn't work on me until now

[growkenzo]

oh makes sense now

[Elena]

Hey hey @Tonasj!

Thanks for reaching out on the Community!

The Friend Activity that shows for different users depends not only on one's personal settings, but also on the people that you follow.

In your screenshot we can see that you have the option ''Share my listening activity on Spotify'' on, which means that people that follow you should be able to see your activity. If you don't see people in your feed, it's possible that your friends have that option off and they need to turn it on.

Could you check with some of the people you follow if they have that toggle on? They can also try try refreshing the setting by togging it off and on again.

Hope this helps. Keep us in the loop here.

[CarlosE]

Hi @gg996,

Thanks for your reply.

Keep in mind that the feature is still available, it's just needed that users toggle it on again from the app Settings to keep sharing their listening activity.

We appreciate you taking the time to share your feedback and we'll make sure to pass it on to the right folks.

Cheers.

[sdubey96]

I hope spotify reverts to its original policy because it was so nice to be able to find new music through friends. I've told a couple already about this update but it's definitely become a pain

[sdubey96]

This is really frustrating and I dont want to have to tell each of my friends individually...

[sdubey96]

Same! i loved spotify for its friend activity page but now that's gone and im really disappointed

[Eni]

Hi folks! 

Thanks for your replies. 

@malfoyyy, just to confirm, have you tried asking your friends to turn "Share my listening activity" on in the app settings? Keep in mind that they need to enable that feature on their end as well so you can see what they're listening to. 

@sdubey96, we appreciate you taking the time to share your feedback with us and will make sure to pass it onto the right team, as we always strive to improve.

We'll be on the lookout.

[Baffen]

Yeah i have the exact same problem. and it seemd it started at the same time as it did for you! so i think its on Spotifys side.

Spotify... PLZ FIX THIS