songs i never downloaded appear in my local files

[gcfsof]

Plan

Premium

Country

Device

iphone xr and macbook pro

Operating System

latest ios and macos

My Question or Issue

i transferred all of my mp3 to my Spotify File on the Files app on my phone and turned on the Local File setting on the spotify app and there’s songs i have NEVER downloaded on that playlist. i looked on my downloaded/purchased tabs on my apple music and in my itunes and i don’t see those songs at all. i also checked on my mac book and those songs aren’t there either 😭 all the other songs i know i put in my files are there so there’s no issue there. but the songs i haven’t downloaded or purchases are on the playlist and i have no idea how to remove them. when i click on them, it says that the song hasn’t been downloaded. i downloaded those songs and put them in the file hoping it’ll allow me to remove it but it just duplicates it and will only remove the new version i added 😞

[MihailY]

Hey @gcfsof,

Thanks for reaching out.

To be sure we understand you correctly, can you please describe your issue in more detail and provide some screenshots or a short video of how things look on your end? Do these songs appear in the Local Files folder or in a playlist in Your Library? Have you tried a clean reinstall of the app?

Keep us posted.

[gcfsof]

hi! yes of course. so when i decided to listen to my local files on spotify, i saw that there were songs that i have never downloaded/purchased appearing on that file. when i click on them, it says that it’s not downloaded. so i went and looked where i must’ve added them or downloaded them but i haven’t. they don’t appear on my files app and they’re not in specific playlists in my library. those songs are only on my liked songs. yes i’ve tried a clean reinstall of the app. the quick one and the longer way. i also attached a screenshot of the songs i’ve purchased on itunes. those songs i know they appear in my local files but i just removed them. 

 

 

 

[Ivelina]

Thanks for the screenshots and details @gcfsof!

To test if it'll make any difference, go to Settings > Storage > Remove all downloads and then Clear the cache as these may be some leftover files causing issues. 

After that it's a good idea to toggle off and on the show Local Files setting within Spotify.

Let us know if it does the trick and we're here if anything else comes up 🙂

[ariri]

Hi I’m having the same issue, but clearing cache and removing downloads still doesn’t do anything. There’s 74 songs in my local files playlist that I don’t actually have downloaded or ever have that display the same message that @gcfsof has when I click on them. I only have this issue on the mobile app on my iPhone. My Spotify local files playlist on my Mac doesn’t show these extra songs.

[Ivelina]

Hey there @ariri,

Welcome to the thread and thanks for the info! It's great that you've already performed some troubleshooting steps as it helps with the investigation.

As you mentioned that these files don't appear on Mac, to be on the safe side, could you go to the Files app on your iPhone and go through the local files that you've added, as well as check if there are some folders with content?

Specifically go to On My iPhone > Spotify and remove any folders/files that you don't recognize (you might need to log out > back in to resync the app).

Let us know if this makes a difference.

[Beastunegb]

I had the same problem, and the solutions above did not help. However, if you swipe left on the local file playlist, they will be added to the liked songs and then can be removed from both the liked song and local file at the same time. I only had like 20 random songs so I just remove them manually. 

[haigo2001]

Hello!
I have the same problem and the above didnt work for me either, can you please let me know how you did this step"and then can be removed from both the liked song and local file at the same time." ?

Thanks!!

[Susan_GP]

Hi there @haigo2001,

Thanks for your reply in this thread and welcome.

Well, the songs that come up as Local Files are audio files that are stored on your device. We recommend checking if the files are there by following the steps shown for your device in this article. If you remove them from your device's storage, they won't come up on Spotify anymore.

On another note, if this happens on an iPhone, go to your phone settings. Go to Spotify. Turn off “Media & Apple Music”. Check if that makes a difference.

If the issue persists, could you send a screenshot showing some of those songs that you don't recognize? We'll take a look.

[emlyx]

Plan

Premium

Country

UK

Device

iPhone 14 Pro Max

Operating System

iOS 18

My Question or Issue

Hi i have old music bought on iTunes appearing on my local files list, is there a way to stop this? i want to keep them separate but when i turn off the setting it disables all my local files.  

[Dessi]

Hi there @emlyx,

Thanks for reaching out!

In order for the local files to show up, you should enable access to Media & Apple Music, which seems like the reason why you're seeing these tracks. It's worth testing if disabling this prevents all your local files from showing up or just the Apple Music ones.

Keep us posted.

[emlyx]

hi thanks for the response,

When i disable this option it gets rid of all of my local files, not sure if it's due to my local files being on my MacBook which im assuming links to my Iphone.

[Dessi]

Hi @emlyx,

Thanks for checking!

We're afraid there's no option to remove these files at the moment unless they're deleted from the local files on your device, which might not be what you want. There's this Live Idea we have on the topic, so feel free to vote for it and show your support. We’re regularly looking for opportunities to enhance the user experience for everyone, so your feedback on this is greatly appreciated.
 

The Community is here if there's anything else you need assistance with.

[xNando]

I have the same problem and no solution has worked but I have seen that if I add the "downloaded" song to the songs I like, it appears as unavailable when playing even the example audio piece so it makes no sense that when you search for a song and add it to your playlist, the same song is then added to your local files but a "version" that is not available

[MihailY]

Hey @xNando,

Thanks for joining the thread.

Can you let us know the model, OS version and Spotify version of the affected device and send us a few screenshots of how things look on your end so we can forward the issue to our tech team? Also, confirm if adding the tracks to your Liked songs playlist enables you to remove them.

@gcfsof, @ariri, @Beastunegb, @haigo2001, please send over the same info as this will help speed up the investigation.

Cheers,

[xNando]

My model is iPhone 15 Pro Max with iOS 18 and Spotify version 9.0.54.640

I think I round the problem at least for me. I currently have an Apple Music subscription, and by chance I've noticed that the songs I add to my Apple Music playlist are being added to the local files folder in the Spotify app. So I tried deleting a song from my Apple Music library, and when I reload the Spotify app, it no longer appears in the local files folder. Is there a way to report this as a bug so it can be fixed in future updates?

(video1.mp4 is the first part of the vídeo evidence and the video2.mp4 is the 2nd part)

[Yordan]

Hi everyone,

Our tech folks will investigate further. In the meantime, make sure you're always running the latest version of Spotify so you don't miss out on any updates.

If you haven't already, it's worth trying the methods below to see if one of them does the trick for you:

► Toggle Local Files off/on + restart the app

Go to Spotify app Settings → Apps and devices → Local audio files, and turn off the Local Files setting. Then, restart the app and turn it back on to force a refresh.

► Remove any leftover local files from your playlists or Liked Songs

Check if they are present in your Liked Songs or any playlist. Removing them from there can sometimes clear them from the Local Files folder.

► Log out and sign back in

If the issue persists, it may be a sync/cache artifact. Logging out of all devices and signing back in a couple of times in a row can sometimes clear these entries.

The Community is here if there's anything else you need assistance with.

Cheers 🤘

[xNando]

Just for information, some songs (not all), if downloaded to listen to them offline, appear in the local files folder in the Spotify app, at least using Apple Music to download the songs offline.

[Joan]

Hi there folks,

Thanks for the replies.

We've tested this extensively on our end and can conclude that this is the expected behaviour. Granting “Media & Apple Music” permission allows Spotify to display all audio files on the device, including tracks from Apple Music/iTunes. These can however sometimes be unplayable due to format or DRM.

The best option would be to remove the undesired files from the device so they don't appear. If this doesn't work for you, you can also do the following:

1. Turn off the “Local audio files” setting in Spotify (Settings > Apps and devices > Local audio files).

2. Revoke the “Media & Apple Music” permission for Spotify in iOS settings.

Hope this clears things up. Let us know if you need anything else.