[Alexa] Multiple Spotify Accounts for Amazon Echo

[rskyles]

My wife and I have our own Spotify accounts. On Amazon Echo, you can create your own profile.  It would be great to link your own Spotify account to your own Amazon Echo account.

Thanks!

[impuls]

The API is available since more than a year, see https://developer.amazon.com/de/blogs/alexa/post/1ad16e9b-4f52-4e68-9187-ec2e93faae55/recognize-voic...

Ignoring this request is a great way to lose many paying customers to Amazon Music Unlimted!

[Datageek]

I have been a Spotify Family subscriber for a few years now but have recently signed up for the Apple Music Family Plan because we cannot have multiple simultaneous  Spotify streams to our Amazon Echo devices. I will shortly stop our Spotify subscription which is a big shame as our elder daughter much prefers it for the social features. 

Apple Music has solved this perfectly so there is no technical reason that Spotify cannot. Very disappointed that this still has not been addressed after so long.

[napken70]

I just can't believe this issue is not being addressed by Spotify.  It would be one thing to ask me or my wife to manage this kind of BS as adults, but for kids....come on **bleep**. They don't have Amazon accounts and are too young for phones.

Better pull your head out of your @$$ quickly......or every family that buys Alexa devices are going to leave.

[TehWardy]

Can someone shut this down?
This issue was resolved many pages ago and yet people are still complaining
about it..

[antonh1]

OK so what's the solution then?

The only one I've seen so far is for 2 adults on a household account, but it requires each to remember to always switch to their account before asking Alexa to play something. So two problems with this:

1. It only works with two adult accounts, whereas many of us also have children who want to use Alexa to play music as well (or do you think music in the home should only be for adults? because I've heard that said before).
2. It requires each user to remember to do something before playing music. This is NEVER going to work in our household. I am not going to try to explain why something that should just work, does not work, and instead they have to do something technical and completely unintuitive every single time they want to play music.  My wife will say "just make it work", and I'll go pay for Apple Music (which I've already started the trial btw).

[Datageek]

^ This ^

TehWardy can you link to the solution please (assuming it works for families of up to 6 people and doesn't require manually switching profiles)? 

[impuls]

Switching accounts is the "solution" @TehWardy proposed few pages before...

As explained above it's extremely inconvenient and it does not work for a family with kids.

It's even more inconvenient when using Echo for smart home automation as everything is configured for one of the two accounts only.

[TehWardy]

The point is ... this is fixed, it works.
Sure it's clunky but it works, the limitation is on Spotify's end though
their API is disgusting and only allows a single stream per account hence
this need to switch accounts.

Instead of complaining that it's not convenient perhaps consider asking
what you expect amazon to actually do here?
Amazon has no control over the one stream limit on Spotify's end so this
requirement to switch accounts fits and works within the limitations
imposed on them by Spotify.

If you know better, suggest an improvement.

The only Idea i've come up with so far is that the Echo be given the
ability to recognise a person from their voice like a human does so if your
kids ask it something it automatically routes that through the kids account.

Home automation is another pain in the ass ... who has authority to turn a
light on ... who has authority to set the thermostat temperature ... but
then who has authority to order what's missing from the fridge?

There's some seriously complex technical questions in here but the simple
act of switching accounts although inconvenient is simply a limit of the AI
at this point in time.
You're basically demanding that Amazon do AI better than the entire planet
right now because individual recognition of voice patterns is a specialist
problem not solved by cheaper consumer hardware at a large scale.

[offbeatmammal]

This isn't fixed. Spotify still create a limitation on what account we can pair with what device. This isn't on Amazon to fix but for Spotify to address ... And they continue to ignore this

[antonh1]

The solution would be to allow one or (preferably) both of the following:

• For Spotify Family subscribers, remove the one stream per account limit and instead allow up to 6 simultaneous streams across all accounts (based on the fact that Spotify Family provides up to 6 accounts under one fixed price plan), so that a single Spotify account linked to a family plan can be used for multiple Echo devices simultaneously within a single household. This is primarily within Spotify's own control, and is how Apple and Amazon handle it. Admittedly this isn't exactly what the original request was, it's more like this one : [Amazon Echo] Play multiple Speakers at the same time - spotify- but it will meet many family's needs. 
• Allow more than 2 (preferably up to 6) Spotify accounts to be linked to an Amazon household, either by allowing teen/child accounts to have their own Spotify accounts linked their Alexa profiles, or allowing more than one Spotify account to be linked to a single Amazon account, and allowing each Echo device to default to a specific Spotify account. So Echos in individual bedrooms (for example) can be linked to any one of up to 6 accounts. For "communal" echo devices that are used by multiple members of the family, it's then up to the user to decide whether they want to have people switch profiles depending on who is asking, or just use a single shared account for those.