Hello,
Truth be told, I have spent the past five hours of my life going through different various emotions all because of this Spotify update and I am going to share every one of my thoughts on this. I am going to try and be as constructively critical as possible.
Personally, I use Spotify to discover, stream, sort, organise, format and arrange music. To do this, I use many of the different sorting tools inherent to the software, and whilst over the years some of these tools have been removed or changed, none of what I would consider the core tools have actually been made worse until now.
I was first introduced to the update when my Spotify client was taking a while to stream a new song. So, I decided to restart the client and was met with the new UI. Initially I thought that it looked very visually pleasing, everything looked softer, less grid-y and overall nicer. However, when it came to actually using Spotify as a music streaming service, that charm quickly fell apart.
The new interface is disorientating and less direct when it comes to finding things that the user intends to find. Things have been streamlined and reduced in a way when they were already at their most efficient state. Features have been added which objectively should be optional/customisable. This update is what I consider one specific category of Spotify user's personal preference for how Spotify should appear, but then applied to every type of other Spotify user very discriminately. Unfortunately I am definitely not that specific type of user.
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I am now going to go through each and every thing that I think that this new update has done right, done wrong and should, at the bare minimum, be customisable. I am also going to order them in what I believe the most important which, whilst including my own personal bias for how I use Spotify, I will try to generalise for a typical Spotify user. I have consolidated the opinions and comments of other users that I also believe to be very important.
0. As a precursor I did not sign up for this update. I do not want to be a beta tester. Given the choice I would immediately opt out of this and want to use the legacy client. Rolling this out to a small number of people to test it is understandable, but why not ask people from the community who wants to be a beta tester? Those people are much more likely to give better feedback and be more responsive to any changes that you want to make. Instead, you have chosen to give this responsibility to some people who really don't want to do it, and this is evident by how few people are happy with the changes that you have made.
1. The moving of the artist's name to underneath the song title within a playlist.
By having different sizes of texts it becomes visually disorientating and gives the song name and artist different significances. Realistically, there are situations where you are only searching for an artist name, except this update makes it harder to see the artist name as it literally hides it under larger text. Why was this better than what it was before? I can understand that it may look visually sleeker, but it removes a whole functionality and search tool, whilst also alienating a whole group of users who primarily sort by artist. Please put the artist name back in it's own column. Furthermore and still very importantly, why is the "sort by artist" function hidden. That's what it is. It is hidden. You cannot see it and have to search to find it. Core functions need to be obvious and easy to navigate.
2. Everything is larger, more spread out and the scale has changed.
It is understandable that visually impaired users need the font and images to be larger, but what I actually liked about Spotify was that it was crammed full of only useful information. Zooming in and out doesn't change the scale, and so objectively less information is on the page. This requires you to scroll more to find the same amount of information as you did before. This is the definition of inefficient which is undesirable. At the bare minimum this needs to be reverted, but idealistically it should be customisable to suit each user.
3. The moving/removal of the search bar
Whilst the search bar is only one single click away, those one clicks add up overtime. I find it quite ironic that whilst the scale has changed and so there is always more space at the top, that the search bar has been removed. There is plenty of room for the search bar to always be there. Please, for the love of God, put it back.
4. The consolidation of other playlists and sections into the "Your Library" category, instead of as they were previously, directly accessible from the home screen.
Just like how there is plenty of room for there to be a search bar at the top at all times, there is plenty of room for these playlists and sections to always be available. Why do they have to be locked into the "Your Library" section? Please put them back.
5. Removing the ability to adjust the width of sections.
There is absolutely no reason to remove this. Removing it prevents customisability and the ability to see large artist, song or album names.
6. Moving of an artist's 'about' page to the bottom
This is a much smaller thing that I consider to be very personal to me, but I actually really enjoy reading up about the artists, seeing their photos and finding out about them. As much as this isn't a deal breaker like some of the other things that I've mentioned, it just feels really, if anything, rude to the artist because this is their story and that is a big part of their music. Why not just have a tab, like before, at the top that is immediate and one click away.
7. Removal of the dislike button for discover weekly, daily mixes, and other personalised playlists.
I don't personally use discover weekly and daily mixes, but I understand that it is Spotify offering you new music, and it is valuable for you to be able to say that you liked that song/artist, or that you disliked that song/artist so Spotify can learn. By removing the ability to say that you didn't, why would people want to continue to use this feature if it doesn't listen to you.
8. Unable to resize the left sidebar - this will cover long playlist names.
This is a small thing, but for those with large playlist names, being unable to resize the left sidebar will always annoyingly hide those names. I do not understand any reason to remove this harmless customisability.
9. Adding album covers next to every song.
I apologise for how this sounds, but I did not pay for a music streaming service to see album art; I paid for the music. When you play a song, the album art appears and I like that. I do not care to see each and every song's album art next to it, especially if I'm not actually going to listen to that song. Furthermore, some album art's are explicit and actually inappropriate for children, and so it seems wrong to display these album art's when not actually engaging directly with the music. Also, as I am personally dissatisfied with the change in scale and reduction in information available on the screen, and so the addition of this objectively less useful information feels extra painful to see.
10. On an artist's page, the discography is not actually in chronological order.
I'm not sure if this is a bug or is unintended, but I sure hope it isn't. Chronology of music is important when sorting and finding things, by putting the music on the home screen of an artist page in a random order it is just confusing and unnecessary, and nothing else. However, when you click on their discography, it then appears chronologically. This is even more confusing.
11. The colour of the downloaded icon is now grey.
Why? Green is rightfully what people are used to, there is absolutely no need to change this, so please don't.
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The following are things that I consider to be bugs or = features that will be changed in the new update on the 30th. However as this is a beta version, it is disrespectful not to change thing immediately if possible because we did not want, choose or pay for this broken or buggy version of the Spotify client. Ultimately, please fix these things immediately.
1. Cannot remove songs from playlist in the playback menu.
If you give people the option, it must be possible. If the option is unintended, remove it.
2. Cannot use the delete key to remove a song from a playlist, or to delete a playlist.
There is no need to remove this.
3. The volume slider is slow to actually change the volume when you move it and is not immediate like before.
It is also very rough and inconsistent in how extreme the music changes in volume. Please keep this as close to how it was previously.
4. The addition of new songs to the top of a playlist, instead of the bottom, as it was previously.
Simply put, this messes with how myself and others have made playlists for years.
5. The songs are no longer grouped per album within a playlist when sorting by artist
Simply put, this changes how people have interacted with the sorting tools, in a way that is not beneficial, and instead is inherently disadvantageous because you are changing what people are used to.
6. Local files are not sorted in track order
I do not personally use this feature, but I can imagine that for those that do, this is deal breaking.
7. No longer a setting to change cache location
Why remove this option? Customisability is king.
8. No longer able to use a proxy.
Why remove this option? Customisability is king. Also, this is a way that many people use your service, removing it completely alienates them and might even prevent them from using the service. Unless this change is legally necessary and is ultimately a last resort, then you have to be prepared to lose customers from this.
9. Sorting preferences are not saved when hopping between playlists, or anything at all.
This is most definitely unintended and Dan mentions that it will be fixed on the 30th, but just please change it now. It takes so much scrolling to go back to where you were in big playlists. This saves me personally literal hours. Furthermore, when sorting through one's followed artist, the default is recently saved and not alphabetical, which is not actually called alphabetical, it is called "creator", which is actually quite vague. I always prefer my artists to be sorted alphabetically, and whilst others may prefer recently followed, I would expect alphabetically to be the default and most popular choice.
10. Using spaces in the in-playlist search bar breaks the search function.
This just needs to be fixed immediately. Nothing else, and there are no excuses not to because it makes searching certain things literally impossible.
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Despite the vastly greater negatives and issues I have with the update, there are a few things that I think the update does well.
1. The immediate visibility of a number of plays a song has.
Personally I like seeing how many plays a song has, just for curiosity's sake, and so I am glad that this is present. However, I'm sure that others might not care for it, so maybe it could be an optional feature, or less prominent
2. Being able to see more playlists under the "Playlists" tab at the top.
More information = better. More playlists in view = better. Better = good. Good = people happy.
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Other interesting things that I want to take note of.
1. The "Your playlists" page has been changed to allow for more playlists in the same screen view, yet almost every other visual piece of information has been massively spread out.
2. Whilst people like things looking sleek and modern, they also like consistency and coherency. This update is a massive shakeup to the beloved traditional visual style of Spotify in the name of sleekness, which loses many of the qualities that made Spotify the most loved music streaming platform on the planet. From looking at other platform's visual styles, this looks like a move towards what they look like, which I think loses some of Spotify's unique identity.
3. Excluding responses from the Rock stars, the feedback on the update from this post is overwhelmingly (90%+) negative and critical. Regardless of personal opinion, the fact that people have turned up, in numbers, to voice their dissatisfaction, needs to be taken into account. Some people will leave without saying goodbye and why they left. Listen to those are willing to give you feedback.
4. User @Sebasty responded that there are key binds to help navigate functions. This should not be a replacement for key functionalities because some people do not use their keyboard when using Spotify, and this alienates those people.
5. This is 2020. The world is moving towards customisation. This update has just removed so many customisation opportunities for arguably no valid reason. WE WANT MORE CUSTOMISATION, NOT LESS.
6. Folders have now got a play button - I cannot at all understand a reason to want to shuffle the songs from a whole folder. I'm sure there are a few people who would want this feature so you can still include it, it just seems very very obscure.
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Closing thoughts.
I have showed this to my friends who have not been give access to beta test this update, and they are also dissatisfied. Unlike my friends, however, this Spotify update is deal breaking for me. I spent the first hour of my evening trying to find out if I could revert back to the previous visual layout. I spent the second trying to uninstall and reinstall a previous Spotify version. I cannot, and I can't stress this enough, don't want to pay for these changes. I spent the third hour of my evening looking at alternative music streaming services that still have the accessibility and navigation functions that I value. I have used Spotify for 5 years, and whilst having mixed feelings about previous updates, I will no longer pay for this service if most if not all of the issues I have pointed out are addressed. It feels so personally disrespectful to inflict this beta testing onto random people, because I feel unable to use Spotify how I want to with these changes, and I am absolutely powerless and can't do anything else about it. Spending two hours writing this essay (5 hours of stress in total) on why I care about Spotify is as much as I willing to do to try and keep the service I have loved for so long as good as it can be for as many people as possible. I know I am one person, and whilst I am among seemingly in the large majority of dissatisfied respondents, I have come to terms with the fact that realistically not much is going to change, and that in 10 days time as the update is rolled out, I will likely be switching to a competitor. I don't want to do this, but it feels like all I can do if I want to keep listening to music the way I want to do. Hope is all I have, but hope I have plenty.
Thank you Spotify, but this is likely goodbye.
Staff / Moderator/ 2 years ago in Social & Random