- Spotify rolled out a bold upgrade for Wear OS
- In addition to new visuals, you can now use touch gestures to play and skip songs
- It is available on all Wear OS compatible devices, provided you update the Spotify app in the Play Store.
Are you a Wear OS user and Spotify subscriber? Your on-wrist experience is about to get better thanks to a major upgrade to some of the best smartwatches, which includes a new graphics overhaul and convenient touch gestures.
If you are a power user of a Samsung Galaxy Watch or Google Pixel Watch, you will now have access to the new Spotify experience for Wear OS provided you have installed the latest version of the Spotify app via the Play Store. In an email to TechRadar, Spotify says the new wave of Wear OS features are “redesigned to be more intuitive, more discoverable,” bringing “the best of Spotify to your watch.” So, what’s new?
First, Spotify’s Wear OS redesign puts visual aesthetics at the forefront of its new “Now Playing” screen, which displays the creator’s art behind the currently playing song as well as playback controls. You can also view and edit your music queue from this view and control audio output as well. When you swipe up and down, you’ll access a new “immersive view,” where the creator’s art is displayed in its entirety without the obstruction of pause and play icons.
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When you swipe up on the “Now Playing” screen, you’ll be taken to the main Spotify home page, where your favorite songs, downloads, recently viewed playlists, podcasts, artists and more will be front and center. That said, one of the most convenient tools is the search function which allows you to search for a song to add to your queue, bringing music discovery features to your wrist.
However, the new update isn’t just about its beauty, it also offers a host of new handy tools. You can now manually use your finger to pause, play, and navigate songs on your watch face, as well as use touch gestures to control playback. One press will pause and play music for you, while two presses will skip from one song to the next.
I’m an Apple Watch user and I’m envious of this upgrade
The best part about Spotify’s smartwatch app is that it takes all the best features of the mobile experience and puts them right on your wrist, providing a convenient way to control your music playback when you’re working out or have your hands tied.
Spotify’s Apple Watch experience is no different from its new Wear OS update. You can still edit your music queue, search for songs, and access your full library of artists, albums, and recently streamed playlists, but it’s definitely not as pretty.
Apple Watch users lack the album art feature, a tool that makes the new Wear OS Spotify experience so bold and visually appealing. Instead, the “Now Playing” page on Apple Watch simply displays the song title and artist, with pause, play, skip, and queue icons on a solid black background. It’s far too simple for my tastes and, dare I say, slightly boring.
However, Spotify for Apple Watch replicates the Home and Your Library tab from the mobile experience, so at least you don’t need to navigate a completely different interface. That said, I hope Spotify gives its watchOS version some TLC in the near future – it should at least emulate the Liquid Glass aesthetic that Apple has been promoting for almost a year.
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