Spotify is finally preparing to add some social features to its mobile apps. The company is developing a dedicated hub called Community where users will be able to see what their friends are listening to. The Hub will also reveal which playlists they’ve updated recently.
The Community feature on the Spotify mobile app was spotted in development a few weeks ago. The streaming giant recently confirmed to TechCrunch that the feature is in the “early testing phase”. Although the company has not officially shared many details about it, some people have been able to access Community Hub. Perhaps iOS users can enter “spotify:community” in the Safari browser to open the page. It is not functional yet, as the listed songs cannot be played. But it gives you a fair idea about the time to come.
At the top, this community center has a horizontal carousel of playlists your friends have recently updated. It comes complete with a playlist title and a timestamp indicating when it was last updated. Below that, you’ll find a vertical list of songs your friends are listening to. Songs are listed in chronological order. If a friend is active on Spotify and listening to a song, it will appear above. All other entries on this list also have a timestamp indicating that the listening took place.
Since Spotify is still developing the Community Hub, things may change by the time it’s ready for prime time. we will keep you posted.
The Spotify mobile apps are finally getting some social features
Spotify already offers these types of social features on its desktop apps for Windows and macOS. A dedicated “Friend Activity” panel lets you know what your friends are doing on the platform. You can see what they’re listening to and even share playlists with them. Thanks to the streaming giant’s Facebook integration, it makes for a fun experience for a group of friends.
Unfortunately, Spotify never offered most of these capabilities on its mobile apps for Android and iOS. Its community forums are full of people asking for social features on mobile. But the company had publicly stated a few years ago that it had no such plans. Thankfully, it has now decided to add the highly sought-after features. Hopefully, the streaming giant doesn’t hold back.
If Spotify goes ahead with development of the community feature on mobile, it should be ready for the public in the coming weeks. We’ll let you know when the rollout begins.
