Already have been having issues with the UI changes, as they're annoying, user-unfriendly, and are starting to have what seem to be accessibility issues. As of sometime today, I no longer am able to see the New Episodes card for podcasts, which is completely gone from my homepage on the website after being pushed further and further down. Instead, I have to click a bell that brings me to a list with full summaries that takes quite some time to scroll through. Fewer and fewer episodes are displayed on the actual pages of a podcast. I only ever look at New Episodes, and the way content is displayed and suggested across the entire site / app has become so annoying that I only use Spotify for new episodes as of right now.
Annoying - The last few updates have made Spotify extremely disorganized and inconvenient in what feels like a shameless grab for increasing engagement. My screen is filled with irrelevant and repetitive trending suggestions, and giant cards that force me to scroll more and for longer. Finding anything is difficult.
User-Unfriendly - I have virtually no control over my own feed; I never look at suggested or trending content. I cannot organize my own playlists or close the sidebar. I cannot opt out of AI "features", only choose not to engage with them. I am being fed episodes and topics I've seen outside of Spotify (such as audiobooks based on my interest in books that I have never searched for or interacted with on Spotify). Many changes feel built on deceiving the user into misclicks or increasing the amount of clicks. I cannot access certain things or previews on mobile (iOS) at all anymore. I will literally never use Spotify to listen to an audiobook.
Inaccessible - I have some design experience. While there is no universal way to handle accessibility, there's a complete lack of hierarchy of information, places where the contrast is too low or the colors get muddied (I can see this being an issue for users with ADHD or vision issues), and the changing or removing of things so suddenly in general (this can be an issue for users with memory issues). There are long blocks of text in some places and not enough room to distinguish certain things without a mouseover in others. Certain things aren't labeled at all (such as the obnoxious podcast cards; some are "trending", but what are others? They're certainly not things I listen to or have any interest in). Being unable to opt out of certain topics, suggestions, or features can be an issue for users with certain phobias or traumas, or even just people who find certain topics uncomfortable.
Let me opt out, revert, and tailor my own experience, and inform users of tests, UI changes, and TOS changes ahead of time. I know these are experiments and / or largely deliberate engagement-farming changes, but stop.
Updated on 2024-12-26
Hey @lionmaki,
Thanks for bringing your feedback to the Idea Exchange!
We’re closing this idea since it doesn’t meet one of our Idea Exchange guidelines, namely point 3: “One change request per Idea.”
Thanks for understanding.