Spotify data storage size on iPhone

[SR_Penny]

I recently installed Spotify on my iPhone 5s (iOS 7.1.1) and have a premium subscription. It's been running fine, but one thing I have noticed is that the app is taking up approx 0.5GB of space on the phone (I noticed this as I have just ran out of space on the device).

The app itself is only about 40MB and I only have one album saved for offline play. I don't have any playlists created or anything.

Does anyone know how/why it's taking up so much space on the phone?

Many thanks,

Steve

[Peter__]

Spotify caches content as you listen to it, think of it as temporary storage which saves you data if streaming when you listen to a track you have already listened to again.

Annoyingly, there is no way to control the size of the cache or clear it without re-installing the app.

[R55Clubman]

Was a Cache cleaning option idea not brought up years ago?

[Peter__]

Yup, but it has never been implemented on iOS (it does now exist on android).

[SR_Penny]

The space taken continues to grow. Spotify emailed me to say it's probably cached data (as mentioned above), but as the device needed it, it would be deleted and the space allocated elsewhere. This hasn't been happening. The phone continues to run out of space (i.e. photos can't be saved etc) and none of the 0.65GB now taken by the Spotify app frees up.

[Joe]

Only way to clear the cache on iOS right now is to reinstall spotify.

[Rodrigo]

This happens due to the App loading your songs on the device for quicker skipping, offline listening if you're a premium user and being easier on the servers. 

If you need that space, currently, the only way to clear Spotify's data on iOS is unninstalling and reinstalling the app.

If you're not needing the space it's using, don't worry. When other apps you use more frequently need that space, iOS will automatically clean Spotify's data. You should see something similar to the screenshot below (look at the brown icon with a star, above Evernote)

[Ringfinger]

Going along these lines, I am a new user with questions and I apologize if they are repetitive.

1.  If I have such a memory issue and I delete and reinstall on my phone, do I lose everything like my playlists, songs, albums, etc?

2.  If I cick available offline, that downloads a local copy to my phone?  It seems when I unclick it, it no longer is available however I assume there would still be a local copy that was downloaded and taking up memory?  Am I misunderstading how this works?

3.  There does not seem to be a way to chose single songs to be downloaded.  I have to do everythibg  have for that album or artist or everthing under songs?  It seems the only way is to set up a playlist with the individual songs you want and they will be avaiable offline when you click the slider?  Is this right?

4.  How does the slider for "offline mode" in settings tie into all of this?

I appreciate all of the help.

[Peter__]

To answer your questions as best I can! 

1. Your playlists, songs, albums, account information are all stored remotely by Spotify so you won't loose any content when you re-install the app. The only thing you will loose is offline playlists which just need to be redownloaded again. 

2. That is correct. In theory, the space should be made available again after a short period of time (once the app knows you didn't press the undownload button by accident) but this doesn't always happen - it is an issue the Spotify team are aware off. 

3. Yup, there is no way to select single tracks for offline mode on Spotify. 

4. The slider in the settings menu forces the entire app into offline mode, which prevents it from connecting to the internet. It is handy if you want to stop Spotify from using any of your mobile data. 

[Ringfinger]

Okay, I get it. It seems the inability to download individual songs is a big flaw but be that as it may. You have been very helpful.

[Ringfinger]

Oh, I forgot. So the best and only way to get individual tracks available offline is to create a playlist with the ones you want and then download only that playlist?

[Peter__]

Yup! 🙂

[Ringfinger]

Okay. Last one I promise. For now ha ha! So, in the playlist on my iPhone app, how do I change order of songs in playlist? I can't seem to do that.

[Peter__]

Press the Edit button in the top right corner of the playlist, you should be able to drag the tracks into the order you like.

[Ringfinger]

I got it now. I was sending them to the starred playlist which does not allow that. I'll start a new tooic with playlist questions. Sorry.

[Ralew]

I read that in Spotify´s takes a portion of all it´s users hard drive in possession. The reasone is cous Spotify itself to some extent acts as a peer-to-peer services to work quickly on mobile devices. Is this true and if so, has it anything to do with your app takes so much space on the phone?

[Hairysoon]

I was able to add single track to offline listening by clicking the song on the album to play. Then click on the playing track at the bottom. This will open up another "page". Then eithe click the + or click on the three dots to ale left add to playlist. Then from the playlist you can select offline listening.

[vynnze]

Hello there!
I'm a new user of Spotify app. My subscription is premium and I have the same problem.... taking up all my device's space. I saved a lot of albums but on each album, i have songs i really don't like and some songs are already in other album. Is there a way to remove them? I almost download all the albums but I want to delete repetitive songs that are still available from other album.

[Hdjdjsnah]

And two years later they still haven't fixed this? Outrageous. Spotify is now wasting 1.5GB (almost 10% of my phone capacity). What an awful app. No the space doesn't auto clean up.

[Carmenpie]

You can put individual songs into a playlist and then make that playlist available offline...