(4.00 out of 5)
After what seems like years but in reality is only a few months, the Spotify iPhone app is finally here! Thanks to the good people at Spotify we have managed to see a demo of the beta version so we can give you our first impressions.
After installing it you see the nice little Spotify app icon on your homescreen, what a welcome site!
Once you have logged in you are presented with the “Playlists” screen, as you can see from the screen grab below they’re all listed in a nice easy to read list view and reflect the playlist you “own” in the Spotify desktop app.
So, we click on Kieron’s R&B Mixtape Volume 1 and you’re presented with this screen:
All the tracks are listed just as you would expect, notice the shuffle feature too. So I decide I want a bit of the mighty Jazmine Sullivan so here we go:
Clicking the info button brings you details of the album that the track was taken from, in this case “Fearless”
From there you can access the whole album and add individual tracks to your playlist. Changes you make here also appear on the Spotify app on your PC and vice versa. But for now let’s go back to the playlist screen for perhaps the most anticipated feature of the Spotify iPhone App, the “Offline playlists” mode.
So I press the Offline playlists button and this is what I get:
Awesome, so I simply select a couple of playlists to sync…
And after a minute or two (depending on how quick your wi-fi is) they’re synced.
As you can see the 2 playlists are now synced and ready to play offline. The big question is how many playlists can you store offline? Well believe it or not you can store unlimited playlists, as long as you take into account the maximum number of tracks you can temporarily cache is 3,333. So what about the search function? Let’s give it a go…
As you can see you can search for either tracks or albums. Importantly, this search doesn’t just search your playlists it searches the whole of Spotify. Cool. It’s really fast too, even on a 3G connection.
So there you have it, my first impressions of the Spotify iPhone app. What struck me overall was how intuitive it is to use, it’s just so very simple, exactly how a good app should be. I would, without hesitation pay the £9.99 a month that it takes to become a Spotify premium member to use this app, it’s absolutely awesome.
What remains however is if Apple will allow it into their app store. Spotify have submitted it and are now awaiting a decision from Apple. Some people are saying that Apple would be mad to allow it as it would have a negative impact on iTunes and MP3 downloads, however I don’t think it will. Although you can store playlists on your iPhone in “offline” mode you can’t do anything else with them. I.e. I couldn’t somehow burn them onto a CD and keep them forever. Sure, it’s great to have them on the iPhone but I’m convinced there are a lot of users who will like to either have them stored as a MP3 file or burned on a CD. Also, Apple have allowed a Last.fm and Pandora app so why wouldn’t they allow the Spotify app? Then of course there’s the 2 million (and rising) Spotify users who would be in uproar if they couldn’t get their hands on this awesome app. Over to you Apple.
russelljsmith said:
Does the iPhone app have an option that allow you to capture number of plays for submitting to Last.fm as with the desktop app?
July 28th, 2009 at 1:09 pm
Joe Connor said:
Best review of this forthcoming App I’ve read so far so well done Kieron.
I believe Apple will allow the App onto the App Store for the reasons you mentioned and to avoid the shitstorm that will be aimed directly at Apple and anti-competition lawsuits which are bound to follow (Microsoft tried and failed to operate a browser monopoly so I see this as the same issue).
I can’t wait to download the App and will be happy to stump up for premium Spotify membership at that point - I’ve been waiting for Spotify to offer something significant before paying for a premium membership and this will be it.
July 28th, 2009 at 1:10 pm
Cedric Wooding said:
Do you know how much memory storing playlists offline takes up?
July 28th, 2009 at 1:21 pm
Phil said:
Looks great. Quick question - does the app run in the background? i.e. can I listen to music via Spotify whilst browsing the web or checking my email?
July 28th, 2009 at 1:23 pm
Areyouspotified.com said:
This is def great news, although I prefer the android version!
July 28th, 2009 at 1:57 pm
eternalsnyx said:
I hope they release a version compatible with Nokia/Symbian phones soon!
July 28th, 2009 at 4:11 pm
supercod said:
Great review, I will be getting this when it comes out. Couldn’t think of anything better than to download my recent favourite playlist to take on a train journey with me, and from what I am reading as long as I am near a Wi-Fi spot I could probably edit last minute provided I give enough time to download of course
Have to say Spotify been magic for finding things I never knew I liked before, am even booking 2 west end shows because of hearing songs via this service, bet the folk that own the musicals have no idea that a service like Spotify gets them new theatre goers
July 28th, 2009 at 5:08 pm
Brief: Another Spotify iPhone application review hits the intertubes said:
[...] of you in countries privileged enough to be enjoying Spotify, have a go at this review posted at sharemyplaylists.com. Oh and one more thing, I made a video for Loren Feldman at 1938media demoing the desktop version of [...]
July 28th, 2009 at 6:29 pm
Beta Alfa » Blog Archive » Här är Spotify för iPhone said:
[...] 2: Share My Playlist har fina skärmbilder från Spotify i iPhone. De upplever tjänsten snabb även över [...]
July 28th, 2009 at 6:46 pm
ellisspice said:
I (might) be going a iPod Touch fairly soon. I was going to install the Last.fm app straight away, but I think this is going straight to the top of the list…
Now all I need is that premium account…
July 28th, 2009 at 8:34 pm
Iphonebloggen » Blog Archive » Spotify för Iphone spelar låtar offline said:
[...] Iphoneprogram har publicerat test som visar lite mer detaljer om hur det ska fungera. Wired och Sharemyplaylists har testat och Techcrunch har sett programmet på nära håll. Dessutom har Spotify själva [...]
July 29th, 2009 at 10:42 am
Afront said:
Great review Kieron, nice perks
Do you know if the offline playlist synching works over 3G or only Wi-Fi?
@Phil - afaik, this cannot run in the background on the iPhone - you need a Google Android handset for that.
Now looking forward to seeing a version of sharemyplaylists that’s optimized for mobiles…:p
July 29th, 2009 at 11:31 am
Apple approves Spotify app for iPhone - goodnight iTunes? | BitterWallet said:
[...] with screenshots from [ShareMyPlaylists.com] Tags: apple, iphone, itunes, spotify Posted in Gadgets, News, tech August 27th, 2009 [...]
August 27th, 2009 at 7:23 pm
Spotify iPhone app coming soon, ShareMyPlaylists.com iPhone app to follow | Share Spotify Playlists at ShareMyPlaylists.com said:
[...] Typically, Apple haven’t given a firm date for when the app will be released for download. At least we can take comfort in the fact that it’s officially been approved though, great news all round. In case you missed it, our earlier review of the app in detail, can be found here. [...]
August 28th, 2009 at 8:46 am
primecut said:
Handy that you will be able to use Spotify on an ipod touch but why have to pay £9.99/month to use the application, seems excessive to me, after all spotify is free on PC’s and the premium spotify only stops adverts which is no big deal to me.
September 8th, 2009 at 9:54 am
9393andersson said:
najs med spotify till iphonen vill fixa det till min ipodtuch
September 23rd, 2009 at 8:55 am