- Spotify's Collaborative playlist feature lets multiple people add songs to one playlist.
- You can make a Collaborative Spotify playlist by clicking or tapping an existing playlist's three dot icon.
- Every song in a Collaborative Spotify playlist will say who added it and when.
Making a mixtape alone is fun. Making one with your best friends can be even better. This is where Spotify's Collaborative playlist feature comes in handy.
As the name implies, anyone can add songs to a Collaborative Spotify playlist — all they need is a link to it. Any song that gets added will show up for everyone, meaning no one ever misses an update.
Here's how to make a Collaborative playlist on Spotify, send it to your friends, and start adding music to it.
How to make a Collaborative Spotify playlist
You can make a Collaborative playlist in both the mobile and desktop apps. You don't need a Premium subscription.
1. Open Spotify and start a new playlist, or open one you already have that you want to make Collaborative.
2. Click or tap the three dot icon underneath the playlist's name and picture, then select Make Collaborative or Collaborative playlist.
Open the playlist's options menu and select the "Collaborative" option. Spotify; William Antonelli/InsiderYou've now got a Collaborative playlist. If you ever want to make it private again, just go through the same steps.
Once your playlist is Collaborative, you can share it with other people.
3. Click or tap the three dot icon again and select Share, then pick how you want to share it. The simplest option is just Copy Link, which lets you share a direct link using whatever app or messaging program you want.
All you need is a link to the playlist. Spotify; William Antonelli/InsiderHow to add someone's Collaborative playlist to your Library
Once you send someone the link to your Collaborative playlist, they can open and listen to the playlist by clicking the link. But unless they want to find and use that same link every time, they should add the playlist to their Library.
Adding a playlist to your Spotify Library saves it to your personal collection of playlists, making it easy to find and open anytime.
To save the Collaborative playlist to your Library, open its link and load it in the Spotify app. Then click or tap the heart icon underneath the playlist's name.
How to add songs to a Collaborative Spotify playlist
You can add songs to a Collaborative playlist just like any other playlist. This includes:
- In the desktop app, clicking and dragging a song into the playlist
- Clicking or tapping the three dots next to a song and selecting Add to playlist
- Using the Recommended Songs feed at the bottom of the playlist
You can delete songs in the same way, too.
Only the playlist's original owner can change the playlist's picture and title.
Every song that gets added will have a name, initial, or picture next to it that notes who added it to the playlist. And if you're using the desktop Spotify app, you can see when they added it too.
You can tap or click a name to see their profile. Spotify; William Antonelli/Insider
William Antonelli
Tech Reporter for Insider Reviews
William Antonelli (he/she/they) is a writer, editor, and organizer based in New York City. As a founding member of the Reference team, he helped grow Tech Reference (now part of Insider Reviews) from humble beginnings into a juggernaut that attracts over 20 million visits a month. Outside of Insider, his writing has appeared in publications like Polygon, The Outline, Kotaku, and more. He's also a go-to source for tech analysis on channels like Newsy, Cheddar, and NewsNation. You can find him on Twitter @DubsRewatcher, or reach him by email at .
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After complaints about bots adding songs to collaborative playlists, Spotify unveiled the ability to manage access on collaborative playlists.
Collaborative playlists allow Spotify users to curate playlists with their friends, but until now any user could pop in and add songs. Bots — most famously one named "Ashley" — took advantage of this and spammed playlists with songs in an apparent attempt to drive up certain artists' listener numbers, to the irritation of many Spotify users. Luckily, now there is a simple way to limit who can add songs to a collaborative playlist.
Spotify added the ability to invite and remove users from collaborative playlist and now lets you make collaborative playlists private to safeguard against bots.
We will walk you through how to manage access on collaborative playlists.
How to add someone to a playlist:
1. Open the playlist
2. Tap the head icon
Tap the head icon. Credit: Screenshot: Spotify
3. Copy the link or share it with a friend via your preferred method
Select which method you want to share the playlist with. Credit: Screenshot: Spotify
How to remove someone from a collaborative playlist:
1. Open the collaborative playlist
2. Select the users directly below the playlist title
Credit: Screenshot: Spotify
3. Tap the three dots next to the user you want to remove from your playlist.
Tap the three dots. Credit: Screenshot: Spotify
4. Tap "Remove as a collaborator" or "Remove from playlist."
Tap either "Remove as a collaborator" or "Remove from playlist." Credit: Screenshot: Spotify
How to make a collaborative playlist private:
1. Open the playlist
2. Tap the three dots
Tap the three dots. Credit: Screenshot: Spotify
3. Select "Make Private"
Tap "Make Secret." Credit: Screenshot: Spotify