Spotify already found success with its popular AI DJ feature, and now the streaming music service is bringing AI to playlist creation. The corporate on Monday introduced AI playlists into beta, a brand new option that enables users to generate a playlist based on written prompts.
The feature will initially turn out to be available to users on Android and iOS devices within the U.K. and Australia and will probably be iterated on within the months ahead.
Along with more standard playlist creation requests, like those based on genre or time-frame, Spotify’s use of AI means people could ask for a greater variety of custom playlists, like “songs to serenade my cat” or “beats to battle a zombie apocalypse,” Spotify suggests. Prompts can reference all types of things, like places, animals, activities, movie characters, colours or emojis. The corporate notes that the perfect playlists are generated using prompts that contain a mix of genres, moods, artists and many years, nonetheless.
Spotify also leverages its understanding of users’ tastes to customize the playlists it makes with the feature.
After the playlist is generated, users can then use the AI to revise and refine the top result by issuing commands like “less upbeat” or “more pop,” for instance. Users may swipe left on any songs to remove them from the playlist.
By way of the technology, Spotify says it’s using large language models (LLMs) to know the user’s intent. Then, Spotify uses its personalization technology — the knowledge it has in regards to the listener’s history and preferences — to meet the prompt and create a personalised AI-generated playlist for the user.
The corporate uses a variety of third-party tools for its AI and machine learning experiences.
TechCrunch first reported in October 2023 that Spotify was developing AI playlists, when reverse engineers Chris Messina and Alessandro Paluzzi shared screenshots of code from Spotify’s app that referred to AI playlists that were “based in your prompts.”
Spotify on the time declined to comment on the finding, saying it could not offer a press release on possible recent features. Nonetheless, in December 2023, the corporate confirmed that it was testing AI-driven playlist creation after a TikTok video of the feature surfaced showing what the Spotify user described as “Spotify’s ChatGPT.”
The feature is present in the “Your Library” tab in Spotify’s app by tapping on the plus button (+) at the highest right of the screen. A pop-up menu appears showing the AI Playlist as a brand new option alongside the present “Playlist” and “Mix” options.
If a listener can’t consider any prompts to try, Spotify offers prompt suggestions to assist people start, like “get focused at work with instrumental electronica,” “fill within the silence with background café music,” “get pumped up with fun, upbeat, and positive songs” or “explore a distinct segment genre like Witch House” and lots of others.
To avoid wasting an AI playlist, tap the “Create” button so as to add it to the library.
The corporate notes the AI has guardrails around it so it’s going to not reply to offensive prompts or those focused on current events or specific brands.
Spotify has been investing in AI technology to enhance its streaming service for a lot of months. With the launch of AI DJ, which expanded globally last 12 months, the corporate used a mix of Sonantic and OpenAI technology to create a man-made version of the voice of Spotify’s head of cultural partnerships, Xavier “X” Jernigan, who introduces personalized song selections to the user. Last 12 months, Spotify said it was investing in in-house research to higher understand the most recent in AI and huge language models.
CEO Daniel Ek has also teased to investors other ways Spotify could leverage AI, including by summarizing podcasts, creating AI-generated audio ads, and more. The corporate has also looked into using AI tech that might clone a podcast host’s voice for host-read ads.
Ahead of AI playlists, Spotify launched an identical feature, Area of interest Mixes, that allowed users to create personalized playlists using prompts, however the product didn’t leverage AI technology and was more limited by way of its language understanding.
