Someone is listening and following my private playlist.

[nghiemvincent12]

Plan

Free

Country

USA

Device

HP Laptop

Operating System

Windows 10

My Question or Issue

My playlist originally started as a public playlist with 0 followers and never gained any. However, after I turned it to private, I gained 1 follower on the playlist, and around that time, I discovered that one of my Spotify followers was listening to my playlist (I learned this via the "Friend Activity" column). When I asked her, she proved to me that it was private (she screenshotted my profile and sent the photo, and the playlist was not there). Whenever I check my profile, it is not shown, too. If it is private, how is she listening to it and following it after I made it private?

[Emilia_8]

Hello @nghiemvincent12, 

Thank you for reaching out here in the Community!

It's possible that she followed that playlist before you turned it to private. She could also save the link and follow it later. 

It's still possible for other users to view a playlist, even if it becomes private, if they are following it or have a link to it. They just won't be able to access it from your profile because it won't be displayed there if it's not public. 

If you don't want anyone to have access to that playlist, you can move all the songs to a new private playlist. 

The easiest way to do that is using your desktop: 

• go to your playlist, 
• select all with keyboard shortcut ctrl+A , 
• drag them to a new playlist.

I hope you'll find this info useful! 

[user-removed]

Most possibly that as you listen to your playlist much now it is shown in the search results when using some key words. So maybe your friend listens to the same music as you do and she's found it in search.
As far as I understood by far the visibility of playlists influences only the visibility on your profile. Your playlist can still be found in search and on artists' profiles.

[Emilia_8]

Hi @user-removed, 

In order for a playlist to show up in search results, it must be set as public. It will also be displayed on user's profile with other public playlists. 

However, other users can still access a playlist, even a private one, if they followed it before or have a link/URI that they can use to search for that playlist. 

Let me know if you have any further questions! 

[user-removed]

Thank you for the explanation very much!

[Emilia_8]

You're welcome, @user-removed!

Have a great day 🙂