How to Block Music Videos in Spotify

Spotify, it’s great that is to say, he has made some amazing choices for users.

There are several panels in the app, and the layout is confusing. Service they follow relentlessly your actions. The app also seems to have an oddity hate playing real albums. This all works to create a general feeling that Spotify is the developers are trying to encourage you to use the service in a certain way.

Therefore, it is understandable that some people are disgusted by the way music videos are added to the platform. Usually, they start playing randomly, in the background, every time the artist uploads the music video. Some music videos have very different sounds from the original music, especially if they have graphics or sound effects, which can be confusing if you want the same type of music. And even if you love music videos (which I do), the decision to have videos play randomly—using bandwidth and battery power—will upset a lot of people.

There are other problems as well. On Spotify’s desktop app, videos are hard to see; They are still small album art group until you can find the hidden, very small Now they are playing the button that expands them. Also, the selection of videos on the platform, and those that are not well known, seem random. Because of this, I look to YouTube first when I want to watch a music video.

The biggest disappointment, however, was the lack of an automatic way to block all videos. That changed recently-there is now a change to stop music videos in Spotify completely, besides the controls that disable the Canvas view (video art) and video clips.

On mobile you can do this by clicking your profile icon in the top left corner to bring up the sidebar. Then click Preferences are privatefollowed by Content and form.

Photo: Justin Pott

In Movies and Canvas you will see three settings: one for music videos, one for Canvas, and one for all other videos. This last update disables video streaming, meaning you’ll get audio podcasts instead. Turn all of these off, and Spotify will use very little bandwidth.

On the desktop app, it’s a little different. Click on your profile icon in the upper right corner, then click Favorites. Scroll down to Movies and Canvas section to find ways to block music videos and Canvas.

I tried this and it worked. The music video icon in playlists and albums disappeared, as did the collection of music videos on Artist pages. The only remaining disabled feature is the Switch to video button in the Now Playing sidebar, which can be found under the artwork. Click it and you’ll be told that the video can’t be played unless you re-enable video in settings. Odd, true, but usually turning this off means you don’t have to think about music videos in Spotify anymore.

I wish Spotify released music videos more carefully. Sometimes I want to watch a video, not always when I play music. Video music videos would be welcome if they flowed differently than audio-only music. I don’t want to find a music video when I want a genre of music, and I don’t think I’m alone. I can only hope that Spotify’s future decisions make things better differentiated.