Spotify is Testing Stories for Playlists
Dec. 1, 2020AfterSnapchat,Instagram,Twitter, and a bunch of other platforms,Spotifyis testing stories. The company is currently testing the feature on select playlists including theChristmas Hitsplaylist andtear dropplaylist. Spotify’s take on stories shows youvideo clips from featured artists on the playlist. For instance, the stories on the Christmas Hits playlist focuses on artists revealing their Christmas experiences along with a couple of behind the scenes tales.
If you’re part of the public testing of Spotify stories,you will see a story bubble on select playlistswhen you open them from the mobile app of Spotify available on Android and iOS.Tapping on the story icon takes you to the story interface. You can then tap left or right to move forward or backward between the available stories.
In a statement toEngadget, Spotify officially confirmed the test.“At Spotify, we routinely conduct a number of testsin an effort to improve our user experience. Some of those tests end up paving the path for our broader user experience and others serve only as an important learning. We have no further news to share on future plans at this time,”a Spotify spokesperson toldEngadget.
While the idea of integrating stories could help improve user retention in the platform, I would have personally loved to have the feature suggest playlists based on my preferences or even artists’ suggestions rather than short video clips detailing their process. It would’ve also been convenient to have stories where users could share songs with their followers within Spotify without relying on third-party social media platforms. Since the feature is not finalized just yet, we could expect the company to fine-tune the purpose of stories based on early user feedback.
Subin writes about consumer tech, software, and security. He secretly misses the headphone jack while pretending he’s better off with the wireless freedom.
