Spotify: How To Use It And Why You Need It

You’ve probably heard of Spotify somewhere. Whether it’s at home, at work, at school, at the bus station, or inside the bus. Heck, you may have seen one of their billboards somewhere! If you haven’t heard of Spotify or you want to learn the ropes on using Spotify, well, you’ve come to the right place. This article is a complete guideline on how to use the ever so popular music app called Spotify.

What is Spotify?

Spotify is an audio streaming platform where you can access millions of songs and podcasts from anywhere in the world. Here’s a list of what you can do with Spotify:

Create multiple playlists. If you’re a music lover and want to create playlists depending on your music tastes, well, I’ve got some good news for you! Currently, there are no limits to the number of playlists you can create on Spotify. However, you can only store 10,000 songs in your library (depressing, I know).

Until now, Spotify is still not removing this policy of theirs despite the users’ demand. But hopefully in the future, they will eliminate this.

Follow artists that you like if you want to be notified if they released a new song or album. Be the first to know if your favorite local or international artists release a new song or album because Spotify will instantly notify you (it’s been a long time since I received a notification about Bruno Mars releasing a new song *sigh*).

Explore different genres of music. Spotify has over 1,000 known genres of music, such as pop, rock, jazz, classical, waltz, and many more! Whatever your taste in music is, you can surely search it up on Spotify.

Listen to your favorite podcasts. Honestly, this is a feature of Spotify that I absolutely love because I love listening to true crime and horror podcasts. Documentary podcasts are just *chef’s kiss*.

Podcasts you can listen to are comedy, games, educational, true crime, sports, lifestyle, arts and entertainment, relationships and business.

Here’s the list of lists of different music and podcasts on Spotify:

Just look at how colorful it is!

Spotify is a freemium service, you can listen to songs or podcasts for free, but in order to access the extra features, such as offline and commercial-free listening, you need to subscribe to their plans which is listed here.

How do I sign up for Spotify?

Well, for starters, you need to download the app first. Here, let me show you how:

For the PC users:

• Download the app here.
• Once downloaded, click the app on your Downloads folder to install it
• Open the app and then press Sign Up. You can sign up using your email or your Facebook account.

For mobile users:

• Download the app on Google Play Store or Apple Store.
• Once you’ve downloaded the app, open it and you’ll then be redirected to the login page.
• Press Sign Up. You can sign up using your Facebook account or by your email address.

How do I download songs on Spotify?

If you already have an existing playlist, go to your playlist then tick the Download button.

Or if you’re a new user and want to create your first playlist, I made this guide for you:

• Find the search icon on the Spotify app
• Tap the search bar

• Type out the name of the song you want to download
• Click on the ellipsis (three dot symbol) alongside the name of the song and then you will be shown the dropdown menu (If you’re on PC, you need to click the song first before finding the ellipsis)
• From the dropdown, click on the Add To Playlist button to add the song on your existing playlist or you can create a new one by pressing the New Playlist
• Go to your newly created playlist or already existing playlist and tick the Download button

What are the Spotify plans?

Spotify is currently offering five subscription plans for using the app:

Spotify Free: This is the free subscription plan on Spotify. This is the default plan for all new users. Of course, there’s gonna be a limit to the features you can access.

You won’t be able to save your favorite songs or create a playlist. You can, however, search up different public playlists on Spotify and be able to listen to them but you can’t shuffle the songs. Plus, there are gonna be ads in between songs (which is really annoying).

However, you can switch to a Premium subscription plan which will give you access to all the available Spotify features.

Spotify Student: Spotify offers a discounted price for a premium plan for all students. Heh, lucky. This plan is the cheapest premium plan as it only costs $4.99 per month upon purchasing. Which means if you qualify for a Spotify Student plan, you can access all the premium features of Spotify with only half the price.

Spotify Premium: If you want to avail a Premium plan for yourself, this is the perfect plan for you. You also get the Premium plan free for 3 months. After the 3 months free trial is up, you will then be paying $9.99 for the plan.

Spotify Premium Duo: This is a plan that is for two people only. You can share this plan with your special someone, a family member, a friend, a co-worker, or a colleague. This plan costs $12.99 and you get 1 month free.

Spotify Family: Now, if you want to share the Premium plan with all the members of your family, you can surely enjoy this plan. This plan costs $14.99 and the limit of the members you can add is up to 5.

How do I know if I’m eligible for a Spotify Student plan?

You’re qualified for a Spotify Student plan if you’re at least 18 years old and is enrolled in a US Title IV accredited university or college.

How do I get new songs on Spotify based on my music tastes?

Thankfully, Spotify released a lot of features to help the users find good songs that they might like and also gives them the opportunity to explore the app more. Here are some of the features that I know you’ll absolutely love:

Recommended songs

You can see the Recommended Songs section at the bottom of every playlist on your library. In layman’s terms, these are the songs that are in the same genre of the songs in your playlist. Or it can be songs from an artist that you mostly listen to. Of course, all playlists are different, though.

Yeah, I really love Pop.

Made for You/Daily Mix

These are playlists that are composed of different genres you mostly listen to and these playlists are all tailored only for you. Every user has different Daily Mixes.

Spotify offers up to 6 Daily Mix playlists for each user. You can see these playlists on your Home screen.

You can probably guess what type of genres I listen to the most.

Based on your recent listening

These are the pre-existing playlists that have the songs you mostly listen to. These playlists refresh whenever you listen to new songs.

Yeah, I’ve been listening to some nostalgic 2000’s songs.

More like [artist’s name]

Now, these are the playlists that are based on the songs of the artist you recently listened to the most.

I just discovered AJR and I’m loving them!

How do I make playlists on Spotify?

For PC users:

• Click the New Playlist button on the left menu bar
• Type out the name and the description you want your playlist to have. The name and the description is optional. You can edit it later if you can’t think of a name and description yet.

• Press Create button. Please do note that if you press the button without typing out a name, the default name would be My playlist #[number of your existing playlists + 1].
• After hitting the Create button, you will be redirected to the playlist itself.

I blurred out my name. Teehee.

• You can come back to your newly created playlist if you want to name it.

For mobile users:

• Click on the Your Library button on the bottom navigation bar
• Select Create Playlist button
• Type out the name of the playlist you want your playlist to have. You can also edit the name later if you can’t think of any.

• Same with the PC version, if you press the button without typing out a name, the default name would be My playlist #[number of your existing playlists + 1].
• After hitting the Create button, you will be redirected to the playlist itself.

• You can also come back to your newly created playlist if you want to name it.

How do I add songs on my playlist?

• Go to the Search bar
• Type out the name of the song you want to download, hit Search
• Click on the ellipsis beside the name of the song and then choose the playlist you want to store it to

Can I listen to my Spotify playlists offline?

Yes, if you subscribe to one of the Spotify plans I listed in here. Currently, there’s no option to listen to playlists if you’re a free user.

How do I skip ads on Spotify?

Free users can’t skip ads for now. My only recommendation is be rich and switch to a Premium subscription.

Can I make money on Spotify?

Why, yes. If you’re an artist and have an original song you want to share to the world, you can upload your song on the platform. Although you cannot upload the song to Spotify directly, you can upload it through the music distributors, such as TuneCore, DistroKid or CDBaby. With every stream, Spotify will pay you $0.0038. So with every 1,000 streams, you will get $3.80.

One way you can also make money as an artist on Spotify is to sell a merch. A lot of international artists do this, like Ed Sheeran.

Someday, I will have one of these. Someday.

How do I recover my playlists?

Fortunately, Spotify saves your data. Unfortunately, Spotify saves your data. If you want to recover a playlist that you’ve accidentally deleted, you have an option to recover it.

• Log in to your account through the Spotify website
• Go to your Account
• Click the Recover Playlists and you will be shown all the playlists that you have deleted
• Once you’ve clicked the Restore button, the deleted playlist will then show up on your Spotify account

Please don’t judge my choice of words on naming my playlists

How do I add a member on my Premium Family account?

Here let me show you how:

• Log in to your account on Spotify website
• Go to your Account
• Click on the Premium Family
• Click Add To Family Plan button

Address is blurred out for privacy reasons

• You will then be shown a link for you to send to the person you want to add on your Premium Family account. You can send them the link via Messenger or WhatsApp or email it to them. If you don’t have these apps, you can copy the link and paste it on other third-party apps.

How do I remove a member on my Premium Family account?

• Once a member has been added, his or her name will show up on the Premium Family page.
• If you want to remove a member, just click on their name and you will be shown this page:

• Now, click on the Remove from Plan button under the user’s name for the confirmation.

Also worth noting that once you’ve removed a member from your Premium Family plan, they will be notified that they are no longer a Premium user and they’re back to using the basic features of the Spotify app.

How do I cancel my Spotify subscription?

• Log in to your Spotify account through the website.
• Under your Profile, go to your Account
• Click the Available Plans button
• Scroll to the Spotify Free plan and click the Cancel Subscription button
• Once you’ve confirmed the cancellation, you will then be switched back to using the Spotify Free plan and will no longer be a Premium user

How much data does Spotify use?

The amount of data that Spotify uses during the stream is dependent on the quality of the music. The higher the quality, the more data the app burns. Here’s a graph of how much data each music quality consumes:

• Low is 24 kbps
• Normal is 96 kbps
• High is 160 kbps
• Very High is 320 kbps

You can check out and change the quality of your music by going to the Settings on your app, scroll down until you find the Music Quality section

Can I find people and my friends on Spotify?

Yes, if you connect your Spotify to your Facebook account. By doing this, you can easily follow your Facebook friends and you can also see the songs they are listening to on the desktop software of the Spotify app on the right side of the screen.

Stalker mode: ON

How do I hide what I’ve been listening to on Spotify?

You can also hide your activity if you don’t want other people to know what songs you’ve been listening to:

• Go to Settings
• Scroll down until you see the Social section
• Under the Social section, toggle the Private session on and the Listening activity will toggle off automatically which will then disable your listening activity.

Is Spotify worth my money?

Heck yes. I can say that confidently as I’ve been using this app for over 5 years now. Amazing graphics, smooth user experience, and millions of songs and podcasts you can listen to.

I have no regrets whatsoever.