Whenever apps or websites revamp a basic UI component that aided our workflow for years, it can initially feel as if something existential has been ripped out of our lives. The moment I noticed the "heart button" was replaced by a checkmark generating a pop-up menu, I felt enraged. More options to consider for something that should be so arbitrary - who on this planet could've asked for that?
But quickly after that, I realized Spotify has introduced a powerful tool that actually takes some burdens off navigating and managing our playlists' content. Especially if one has numerous playlists, like me.
What stays the same:
- Tap "like" will simply add a song to our "liked songs". Just like before.
After that, the button turns into a sort of playlist manager.
- We can now instantly see to which playlists the same song has been added. Something we previously had to memorize ourselves - which is near impossible.
- Deleting the same song from multiple playlists can now be done from the menu. Before, we had to open each relevant playlist (assuming we would've remembered which ones), locate the song and delete it.
But perhaps my favorite new feature addresses an issue I had for years already...
When quickly sifting through dozens of releases a day, hundreds a week, thousands a year, I can't remember all the songs I once liked enough to be added to a playlist. More than often, I wasted time scanning through, and selecting songs from an album for the second time, because there was nothing in the UI that somehow indicated I had already done so before.
Now there is! On albums and artist pages, songs that are already present in our playlists are indicated as such by the green dot - similar to how it has always been for liked songs.