Do you want your life to sound like a movie soundtrack? With your favorite songs included, you may personalize and create your Spotify playlist.
A few years ago, the captivating soundtrack of HBO’s popular series Big Little Lies enthralled viewers (Opens in a new window). With songs like “Papa Was a Rolling Stone” by the Temptations and “The Wind” by PJ Harvey on her iPod touch, the child of one character, for instance, makes super-hip playlists that mirror the numerous situations depicted in the episode.
It inspired me to make my own hip or, more properly, not-so-hip playlists, and I’m not the only one. Despite my skepticism that a small child could have such super-cool playlists, I’m not the only one (Opens in a new window).
A playlist is only a collection of music or audio snippets that are played back through a streaming service or on an audio device. You may create personalized playlists for events, workouts, or just lounging around the home using your favorite songs rather than clicking around Spotify to move from song to song.
You may make playlists on your phone, mobile device, or computer with only a Spotify subscription—free or premium. How? Read on.
get started
Start by registering for one of Spotify’s two subscription plans: the free, ad-supported account or the $9.99/month Premium version. Then, on your devices, download the Spotify app(Opens in a new window). A playlist may be made on a computer or a mobile device using the online player, and it will sync across them all.
Whether you have the free or premium version, you may listen to any song by any artist on your desktop and move forward or backward to play it (the free version will interrupt with ads, though).
On mobile, however, users of the free edition are only able to shuffle-play their own playlists. The free tier of Spotify features 15 “self-driving” playlists that let users play songs in any sequence with unlimited skips, such as Daily Mixes, Discover Weekly, and Release Radar. Premium subscribers may download their playlists for offline listening, such as on a plane or in the metro, and listen to them while offline in any order with unlimited skips.
Here’s how to get started on both versions of the service. Playlist building changes differently between the free and Premium memberships.
On a computer, make a playlist (Free and Premium)
Launch the Spotify online player (Opens in a new window). On the bottom left, look for the New Playlist option. When you click the + symbol, a pop-up will show up. Hit Create after entering a name for the playlist (you have the option of including a photo and a description, but these are not necessary). The left-hand menu’s Playlists section will then display your new playlist.
Add a song to the computer
Imagine that while using Spotify on my computer, I come across the song “Runaway Train” by Soul Asylum and decide to add it to my playlist of “Songs that make me weep.” I just place the online player’s pointer over the music, look for a three-dot icon, click on it, and select Add to Playlist. When I choose a playlist from a list of my available ones, the music is added to that playlist.
Make Playlist edits
Click the three-dot symbol to the right of the song, choose Remove from this Playlist, and the music will be deleted from the playlist on the web player.
When using the free version of the Spotify mobile app, go to your playlist, hit Add More, then pick Remove from this Playlist from the menu that appears.
Remove from this playlist by on the three dots next to the song on Premium. Enter your playlist, hit the three dots in the center of the screen, then choose Edit to easily remove a number of songs. The songs on your playlist will have a white circle with a line across them. To erase, tap. (To undo an accidental deletion, tap Cancel > Discard.) Select Done in the upper right corner after you’re finished.
You may completely remove your playlist if you’re tired of it. Right-click it on the computer and choose Delete. Tap the three-dot menu on a mobile device (free or premium) and choose Delete playlist.
A song or playlist that has been erased from one device—say, let’s a phone—is instantly also deleted from all other devices, including the online player. If you unintentionally delete a playlist, go to your profile page(Opens in a new window) on Spotify and select Recover Playlists on the left to retrieve it. To restore them, click Restore.
