New Desktop Experience - your feedback wanted!

[Hubo]

Spotify is testing a new way for you to connect with your music on Desktop. The new desktop experience features an all-new design, streamlined with the Spotify apps on all your devices. 

This is a brand-new experience and some parts are still being fine-tuned. Be sure to give feedback with the steps below to let the right folks know what you think could be improved.

The other Rock Stars and I got the chance to test the new desktop experience first and now more users will be able to test it out and give their feedback for the team. If you are a passionate Spotify user and would like to join the Rock Star Program and be part of cool experiences like this, then check out this help article.

How do I know if I’m using the New Desktop Experience?

The new desktop experience is not hard to spot with its new design! Your Library looks like this for example:

 

Why did the app change? 

This test is rolled out to a specific group of users at this moment. It’s not possible to sign up for this right now, but your interest is really appreciated. If you’re interested in testing out new versions of Spotify before everyone else, check this out: https://community.spotify.com/t5/Spotify-Answers/How-do-I-become-a-Spotify-Beta-tester/ta-p/4551518. 

If you’re looking for more information about how tests work and about how features are released, take a look here: https://support.spotify.com/article/why-am-i-seeing-different-features-than-my-friends/.

How to give feedback?

This thread is your go-to destination for asking questions, getting help for issues you may have, as well as to share your impressions and feedback on this new desktop experience. 

Keep in mind that pictures can say a thousand words, so if you have any screenshots of something you’d like to share of your experience be sure to post them here as well! The right teams at Spotify take their time to read the posts in this thread and use your feedback to fine-tune this new experience for everyone.

[Hubo]

Hi Everyone,

Dan here from the Desktop team again.  Desktop 1.1.55 is starting to roll out now and I wanted to let you know what to expect.

Fullscreen mode
We’ve brought back a new and improved fullscreen mode for Desktop, making better use hi-res artist imagery where available.

Playlisting

• The “create similar” playlist context menu item has been added to the main playlist list in the app
• We’ve improved playlist loading performance when navigating throughout the client
• Show the downloaded badge in the liked songs button when it’s available offline
• Improvements to the use-case of filtering to find a track within a long playlist
  

General

• Episode sorting on podcast show pages, back with improved performance
• Podcast play order improvements, better selecting which episode to play when playing from cards/search etc
• Added the ability to see subtitles on videos where they are available.
• Improved refreshing of content on Home to ensure fresh content
• Show the top 5 cities where people listen to an artist on the artist about page
• Where there are multiple versions of a release, show a dropdown on the album page allowing the user to switch between them

As always, please do ensure you’re fully updated and are running the latest version. We again thank you for the feedback provided. 

Thanks,
Dan

[ravekanth]

Just got updated 🙂
Still exploring but I immediately noticed that the sorting settings aren't saved. 
Every playlist is just sorted by added date. When I change it and leave the screen, it reverts back 😞 

[jgooderson]

My personal feelings on this new design is that it somehow looks cheaper and unfinished. It looks and feels like a website, and that is not positive.

I really cannot understand the removal of the search bar from every page, I think putting that away in a search menu is a bad move.

And I also echo the feelings of many I've read so far, I do not know what album a song is on, and I don't care to listen to an entire album at once. I want to be able to see songs from an artist.

[rockclimberclow]

I'm honestly not sure why you are paying your GUI and desktop team for this useless, and non-functional "upgrade" when you could be paying artists more. Would love to hear from someone on the Spotify team as to why they thought the need for this.

[Skylordzaneo]

Things I don't like is that, when adding a duplicate song to a playlist, it no longer notifies that you are adding a duplicate. I usually make a playlist full of my liked songs so when I bulk add a bunch of songs I find I keep adding duplicates when before I just pressed the skip button. Now another thing is that when on an artists page, the album section no longer shows the albums chronologically, whereas I like to listen to new artists albums' chronologically, now I have to go through and find the release date of each album; what would be best is to add a sorting option of some sort like 'Sort by Popularity' or 'Sort by Release'. And this one is not as big as a problem but I would like the fullscreen option back.

[petra202]

One thing I find a tiny bit annoying with the new update,  is that the playlist's photo/cover changes everytime you add new songs to your playlists. Before the playlist cover was made up of the four first songs' album covers, which I liked because it was easy to associate a specific playlist with the playlist cover - because it stayed the same over time. 

At the moment, the playlist cover looks different every day when you add new songs, so it is quite confusing when playlists you have had for years suddenly look different. 

And when you have a lot of playlists - having the same cover for a playlist is helpful and it feels more organized.  For me at least, it is much easier to remember a playlist based on the four first songs I added than the four last songs I added.

[TachiFoxy]

---

@Sebasty wrote:

@TachiFoxy 

The Recently Played section is accessible via Home page, should be a second section from the top.

Is that what you meant?

---

Nope, I don't have that section on my Home page. It's there on mobile, but not on Desktop.

If you have it, then that's selective feature-sets per user, which is also something that shouldn't happen on a UX-basis. A basic feature like that shouldn't be tailored towards the user. That's what all the "discover" playlists are for.

[thegrimbeaker]

Not overly thrilled with the new version of the desktop app. It is faster at loading which is welcome however there are far too many negative changes;

Compacted Artist Page

Unlike the previous versions of the app, the Artist page no longer displays each artist's songs grouped by albums. Now the page just displays the most recent releases of their discography, meaning if an artist has more than say, 6-8 releases, a user is required to select 'See All', to then move to another page that displays all the releases, from there the user would have to open a specific release just to get the desired track. I assume that was to help with the loading times, however, this results in an unnecessary convoluted process just to listen to a specific song.

I predominantly prefer to listens to albums over random tracks, however on occasions when showcasing an artist via picking out select tracks across their discography, this updated method makes that incredibly frustrating.

I would also expect users who may not be particularly familiar with an artist's full catalogue but like a specific song, will find it very difficult to now find that song. Not every person who wants to listen to Fleetwood Mac's 'Go Your Own Way' will know that it is found on their album on Rumours, or AC/DC's "You Shook Me All Night Long" is taken from Back in Black (even if both albums are in the top 10 best-selling albums of all time). Obviously, there is the top 5 most popular tracks instantly visible on each artist's page, but that isn't going to cover all the songs that a user somewhat unfamiliar with the artist is potentially looking for.

No Artist Header in the Playlist Screen

Older versions of the playlist screen, used to have the following headers;

• Title

• Artist

• Album

• Duration

Each of those could be used to sort the playlist, e.g., Artist A-Z. However, the updated version has seemingly been removed the Artist column, and compacted that info with the song title. This gives the appearance that a user can no longer sort by artist, which is very unhelpful, especially when dealing with large playlists. It has since become apparent that you can sort by Artist by cycling through the sort by Title options, however this is not clear at all, and once again replaces a function that previously worked fine with a much more convoluted replacement process, one which is not even highlighted/explained.

In addition to the above, it should also be noted that the grouping of the song title and the artist increases the row height which leads to less tracks being visible on screen, so the removal of the Artist column is not only impacting the function of the app, it is also affecting the form.

Hiding the Discover & Release Radars

The moving the Discover & Release Radars screens from the left-hand tab to the 'Made for User' screen, which is accessed from the Home screen is again, another instance of having to move through multiple screens just to see the something that under previous version was a single click away. It is very annoying and not friendly for new users. This is particularly frustrating with regards to the Release Radar as it is another backwards change in a long line of backwards changes that have impacted how easy it is to see what new releases my followed artists have out, especially as this seems to have coincided with a change to weekly New Releases email that gets sent out, with the most recent email being just being the following text;

"Your Release Radar is here: Fresh tracks by your favorite artists, including xxx, on a personalized playlist that we update just for you every Friday. Listen to it now on Spotify."

Until last week, the email would highlight a number of bands, with details of the releases, including cover art. It is hard to see how this latest adjustment is anything other than another way to make it much harder to find out about new music I would enjoy.

The Removal of the Search Box at the top of the app

While not as egregious some of the other changes, the removal of the search function that was visible at the top of the app window is an annoyance. I am aware that there is Search option on the left-hand tab, however that directs to a different screen than the one you are currently in, which if you want to search for something based on what you were currently viewing, that is no longer a viable option in the updated experience.

On the plus side, I don't mind how the followed artists/podcasts/saved albums have been compiled under the 'Library' option (even if again, it does yet again mean that a user has to make more clicks to get to a desired screen), as I assume this is helping with the speed the app operates at. It does also appear that more artists are visible per row under the Library\Artists screen, which is welcome.

Overall, while the app performance is quicker, it is far from a streamlined user-friendly experience.

I do have a question though, will this update finally fix the bug that occurs if you follow more than 1000 artists? Because that has plagued me for years, and even after going through the issue with support and replicating it on a test account last year, it was still present to this update (I haven't tested it on the new build yet).

[Kuyosakee]

Update is **bleep**ed and everyone who thinks it's good doesn't have even one braincell.

New UI =/= Good UI

Scrolling through a long list lags probably because of addition of the album arts.

Search bar is gone and can only be accessed in the search tab. This is stupid.

Surfing through songs (pressing next) lags.

Sorting by artists name is hidden and took me 2 days till someone mentioned to press sort by title few times, dumb.

Volume slider is longer. Small inconvinience but it bugs me.

Fixing updates as they go is not making the illusion of making you look like you actually take care of the software, it makes you look stupid because this clearly wasn't tested.

[Hubo]

Hey @User98, thanks for sharing your concerns about your account's security here.

All Spotify's records are safe and secure and have not been breached. Right now, there's a few things you can do to protect your account. Check out all the steps here: https://support.spotify.com/article/protect-your-spotify-account/.

Let me know if you need any help!

Have a great day,

Hubo

[Hubo]

Hey @xaoobbx, thanks for sharing your feedback in this thread!

On the 30th of November there will be an update where sorting settings are saved! Hang tight! You should still be able to sort by artist name by clicking three/four times on the: 'Title'-column. Also, you should be able to hide Friend Activity in 'View' in the toolbar. Let me know if that works!

Thanks again for your feedback, have a great day,

Hubo

[Hubo]

Hey @ravekanth, thanks for sharing this here!

That's a good point! On the 30th of November an update will be released where this should be fixed. If you have any other feedback, feel free to post it here. 

Have a great day 🙂

Hubo

[Hubo]

Hey @hannes0, thanks for letting me know about this!

Your feedback reaches the right folks at Spotify loud and clear! Thanks for sharing this. Adjusting the volume with the scroll wheel should be all smooth again with the update from the 30th of November. Let me know if that still doesn't work after that.

Have a great day 🙂

Hubo

[Hubo]

Hey @Jakeprice1995, thanks for your comment here!

The folks at Spotify read all feedback that gets posted here. It's an important part in further shaping this new experience.

I'm glad you decided to share what you're missing from this update and I hope this will be brought back in a future release.

Thanks again for sharing your feedback here,

Hubo

[Hubo]

Hey @Edscat101, thanks for posting here!

Glad to hear you're liking it! You're in the right place to let the Desktop team know that you're missing this feature. All feedback in this thread will be taken into account. Hopefully it'll be brought back in a future release. 🙂

Thanks again for sharing here! 

Hubo

[Grunchtherunch]

I hate this design. And the one before was bad too.

Allow me to view things the way I want to view them.

- List view in Your Library instead of a mass of gigantic thumbnails

- Select default on the artist's page rather than playlists

- Change the artist's profiles back so that you can view all their songs by album as before.

- You now have playlists twice - once in my library and once on the left tab. I would like to remove the left tab completely or have the social part there instead of playlists.

List view pleeeease!

[IeuanHa]

On the whole, I like the new styling, but I find some functionality to be missing. Usually I like to sort my playlist in order of songs I have recently added to it, but now that is not possible, unless I drag Spotify onto my larger monitor.

On my laptop screen it looks like this:

Whereas on my monitor it looks like this:

[Hubo]

Hey @IeuanHa, thanks for posting here!

Glad to hear you're positive about the new experience! 🙂 Hmm, I can imagine sorting by date added would be useful on any device. I'll definitely pass that along the right folks.

In the meanwhile, as a workaround, could you try to see if this column shows up if you 'Zoom Out' a few times in 'View' in the toolbar? Let me know how you get on!

Have a great day,

Hubo

[jrow]

Already wrote a detailed feedback why I'm not happy with the new "experience" (it feels rather limited instead of offering possibilities)

What I also discovered: if I want wo move a song in a playist to antother position, the screen is not moving up or down automatically. So if you have a playlist with 100 tracks and want to move the last track to the top - pretty time-consuming. 

[highlyint]

Just got the new design today. I don't mind it too much except for one thing, which is seeing a list of all songs by an artist.

I just want that list view back.

It's 80% of how I use Spotify. I go to an artist, double-click the first track in their latest album, and let their entire back-catalog play out. Sometimes I hit shuffle.

With this new design, there's no simple way to do this. I can't just click an artist name & see all their tracks like I used to. Sometimes just playing a single album takes three clicks. And of course, once the album is finished, Spotify starts recommending songs (which is fine, but they are almost always the exact same songs).

Please give me back the list of tracks on an artist page. Make it look the same as the playlists, add it way down at the bottom, or under yet another 'See all' button, but godammit please just put it back.

Thanks. Love you.

[Fi15]

This is the first time I have had to post in Community since I signed up for Spotify. 

Firstly I find it upsetting that I have been forced into beta testing an update of a product I am paying for,  without being told or being give an opt out. I beta test computer games but am always asked if I wish to participate. 

So on to the review...

If it had to describe my feelings towards it in one word... loath. I hate it, not so much for its look but for the fact that, for me, it has lost most of its functionality. If there is no way to go back to the previous version I may have to rethink keeping my subscription. 

I mainly use Spotify to listen to podcasts, about 3/4 of my time on the app, which is all but impossible on with this new update. 

Firstly in the old version I could sort the episodes from oldest to newest which I cannot do anymore. I was 187 episodes into a 300 plus series and now I have to scroll down to find each episode to listen to them in the correct order which kind of defeats the purpose of listening to a series. 

Then if I want to try to listen to an episode I have to make it available offline before it will play (even though I am on line). 

Because of the above the auto play function doesn't work.

I also agree with the other reviews about the search bar, the search function, artist information and volume, though I see some of these issues are to be fixed.

I do think the layout looks good, but what is the point of having a good looking format if it loses all functionality. The reason I originally got my subscription so I could have all my podcasts in one place across all my devices and the access to music was a bonus but with the new update I am basically paying the same amount of money for something that has lost 3/4 of its usefulness to me.