Top Genres are off

[ChrisN908]

Plan

Premium

Country

USA

Device

(iPhone XS Max)

Operating System

(iOS most up to date)

My Question or Issue

On both mobile and desktop the top genres are off for me.  I listen to a lot of Metal, and Metal is no where to be found on desktop or mobile. Desktop i have only 2 top genres (because 2 were replaced with podcasts) and they are Rock and Punk.  Desktop is even more off where it shows me Rock, Indie, Hip Hop and Pop. I very rarely listed to hip hop or pop. 

The recommendations like album picks, favorite artist, best of artists and the made for playlists all pretty accurately represent my tastes, which makes the top genres being off even more confusing. 

Attached here is my top genres from mobile and desktop, along with my top genres from statsforspotify.com.  As you can see the top genres are not accurate to my tastes. 

[sierrak-walton]

That is strange...hmmm. Maybe it is a coding/algorithm hiccup? Maybe they haven't made a "Metal" genre playlist?

[ChrisN908]

No that’s not the case. Back before they were promoting podcasts they would show 4 top genres on mobile. Metal was one of them. When they changed it to 2 they left me with punk and rock.

I’ve even resorted to leaving my work computer on playing the new metal tracks playlist on a loop on mute to try to get it back. So far no luck

[sierrak-walton]

That is frustrating! I hope the issue gets resolved. 

[ChrisN908]

Thanks. Super frustrating. I was hoping to find an online chat about it instead of posting here but I couldn’t find anything.

ive seen others complain about the same thing. who knows what the issue is.

[CarlosE]

Hey folks,

Thanks for reaching out to the Community and welcome!

Your Top Genres section might not always be as accurate as you'd expect based on your listening habits, as it's sometimes updated to reflect recently played genres even if you played one song of such genre.

No worries though, as @ChrisN908 mentioned, this won't have an impact on your actual recommendations and playlists made for you.

However, we understand that it can be confusing and appreciate you taking the time to share your feedback. We'll make sure to pass it on to the right folks as we always strive to improve the app and the overall experience.

If you need a hand with anything else, the Community is here for you.

Cheers!

[ChrisN908]

Carlos, this has been an ongoing issue. I have been a premium member for years and my top have not been right and do not change at all. these top genres have been static on both mobile and desktop for as long as I can recall.

I don’t understand how you can get the playlists right and artist recommendations right but the top genres are consistently wrong. Prior to Spotify getting into the podcast game, it showed me metal on my mobile device as the 3rd top genre, but that was removed when you changed it to 2 and replaced the other 2 with podcast stuff.

Are there financial reasons, such as payments from labels, that prevent me from seeing metal as a top genre? That’s the only thing I can think of since your algorithm knows what music I like but your interface doesn’t serve it to me properly in that area.

[ChrisN908]

i got an email from spotify asking if the solution has been found, and it has not. 

in the week that has passed i have become more convinced that financial interests are playing a part in the genres that are being served to me.  See the attached.  Suddenly, monday morning, the punk genre was removed and indie shows up. Right under a Billie Eilish ad.  What is on the new indie songs playlist? why none other than Billie Eilish. 

I know that marquee recommendations show up, which are clearly bought and paid for.  Does the same happen or play into the algorithms for recommended genres? 

The way that 2 of the top 4 genres were removed for podcasts when spotify made a big push into the podcast space also plays into my thinking here. 

[ChrisN908]

the billie eilish ad (campaign?) is over and punk is back.  Its really not cool for you guys to mess with the top genres for people as advertising. if this is whats going on, which it certainly seems like, it is pretty anti-consumer, especially if its a hidden secret thing.

Please tell me im wrong here and your algorithm is just trash for the top genres.  thats better to me than the top genres being part of a marketing campaign. Id rather it be wrong due to the technology being bad than you guys messing with it for marketing bucks.