Spotify Reportedly Working on Feature That Allows Friends to Control and Build Playlists

Those petty fights over who controls the aux cord may soon become less frequent.

On Friday, Mashable reported that Spotify had developed a new feature that allows multiple users to control and build a single playlist through their respective devices. The feature is dubbed “Social Listening” and was discovered by software engineer Jane Manchun Wong in Spotify’s Android app code.

There are many unanswered questions surrounding the feature, as Spotify has remained tight-lipped about the reports. “We’re always testing new products and experiences, but have no further news to share at this time,” a spokesperson told Mashable. But from what we can tell, Social Listening will be reminiscent of the now-defunct Turntable.fm, which allowed people in different locations to simultaneously enjoy a single playlist. Social Listening, however, will let each listener contribute to the playlist with a real-time component, which distinguishes it from Spotify’s current Collaborative Playlist feature. 

So, how will this work? It seems all you have to do is go to the connected devices menu and select the “Connect with Friends” option. The user will then receive a QR-style code and a link that can be sent to friends. The user will also have the option to scan a QR code on someone else’s device, which will grant access to the joint listening session. From there, all connected users will have the ability to add to the queue.

You can check out screenshots of the Social Listening prototype below.