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Android Widget Removal

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Android Widget Removal

We’re here to let you know that we are retiring the Spotify Widget for Android this week. 

 

We always take retiring features in Spotify very seriously. We’re pouring our energy into new ways of creating the best experience for our users.

 

You can still easily access the same playback features as well as information about what is playing through the Spotify playback notification and device lockscreen.

 

Screen Shot 2019-08-08 at 12.49.40 PM.png

 



To access the playback controls on Android simply swipe down while you are using Spotify to access the controls.


Screen Shot 2019-08-08 at 12.49.48 PM.png

 

If you’re interested in learning more about how the app evolves, check out our article about testing and why features change.

 

We’re also welcome to feedback from our users. The best way to give us feedback to is to write an Idea in our Idea Exchange

 

Thanks!

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518 Replies

It's incredible. Google play, amazon music, APPLE music or heck basically ANY OTHER media player out there support widgets because it's a a basic functionality for a media app on android. 

 

**bleep** me. I've been a premium subscriber for over 5 years, I've always been like "hey these changes aren't THAT bad" even when they took lyrics away and replaced them with this behind the lyrics nonsense no one asked for. But they FINALLY p i s s e d even me off one too many times.

 

Get you're act together, no one wants features removed for no **bleep** reason. 

This sucks. I used the widget every day. 😞

Please bring the widget back. It was the single most used widget on my screen. Why remove the most popular UX element?

I used the widget, very sad to see this go. 😞

Not sure how the **bleep** devs or project managers thought that was a good idea. Instead of having something that works on screen you need to drag a menu to change music. What will be next… let’s remove “next” button as user can simply swipe progress bar to the right to play next song. Hate the idea and it is a downgrade to me and by the comments I’ve seen to others as well.

To me this is the first nail in the coffin and I will start looking for a new platform. 

“In bird culture that is considered a **bleep** move”

Yuuuuup and just like that Spotify's stock dropped like a rock from the sky.

 

Cancelling my premium as we speak, The Desktop app is slow**bleep** and the widget is the only reason I still subscribed to Spotify.

 

Peace out homies. It was Real. Aslo, if the dev's see this.. how can we move music in our Queue but not our actual liked songs... No.... i gotta unlike then like the song again to put it to the top of my liked list? Yeah, okay Spotify somebody on your dev team is DRUNKKKKK. Go home because your andriod users are packing it up.

Is your app instumented? Did you have any idea about how many people use the widget before you decided to remove it? This is an easy thing to do and it is a good idea to base changes on some real data rather than trying to judge the impact from lost customers.

 

Do you have a UX engineer? (Or maybe more than one?). What are they saying about the user experience on Android now?

 

The way you approached this change makes your organization look amateurish. I think the seasoned devs in your organization will be appalled by your lack of thought and consideration of the customer.

 

Put the widget back and take a more professional approach in future.

I used that everyday. I'm very disappointed that it's been removed. And I honestly don't see the benefit of removing a feature I would definitely like to see this re-added as the lock screen controls don't always work for me.

Bien gusta **bleep** la nueva actualización sin widgets y lo queiro de vuelta o cancelo mi suscripción y me voy a dezzer que si tienen widgets y si escuchan a sus clientes.!

 

Horrible idea, unless you're going to allow us to start a song playing through a long press on the icon. 

Bring back the widget and the ability to quickly search for songs in your playlist by draging down instead of the stupid 3 dot menu... I don't want the app to be more like IOS, then I would simply purchase an IOS device.

 

And add HIFI subscribtion... 

 

I don't care about your **bleep** Podcast feature, give us features for our musical entertainment. 

 

Been a subscriber almost every month since 2011,  the last 2-3 years you've just removed and removed featrues. Gonna switch to Tidal or something. 

I thought the Word was bringit back, so Spotify add it back or, lose users only to decide, the worst idea u Evert had, i thought it was a joke... 😞

No sé qué piensan como desarrolladores pero son una porquería todo este tiempo solo han pasado dañando la aplicación y en vez de solucionar todo los Bugs eliminan el widget.!

Si no regresa el widgets voy a dezzer ...!!

 

Not cool, not cool at all 😤

Ridiculous, bring it back, these are the features I appreciate most about my Android phone. Don't try to be what we don't use, iOS. 

Please, bring back the widget!!!!!! 

Bad bad move! I used the widget A LOT. Why would you remove it?

Absolute joke.

Widget had pride of place on my homescreen and used it daily.

If I didnt want widgets, I'd get an iPhone.

I pay £15 a month and dont even get consulted when something important to me is removed.

Seriously considering Deezer now..

Your loss Spotify....

Please bring back the widget, your work around from my lock screen does not work. Spotify is now very frustrating to use.

I feel like an **bleep**, I've been telling everyone to get Spotify, and now it looks like I'll be cancelling my subscription!  How anyone could think that removing widgets makes for a better customer experience is beyond me.

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