Topline
Spotify users criticized the streaming platform on social media for a disappointing 2024 Wrapped package, which they say was marred by a longer-than-usual wait, underwhelming features and a lack of statistics compared to other music streamers.
Spotify Wrapped rolled out to users on Dec. 4, a later release than the past four years. (Photo by … [+]
Key Facts
Unlike previous iterations of Spotify Wrapped, and unlike competitors including Apple Music and YouTube Music, Spotify did not tell users their top genres of 2024.
Spotify Wrapped also does not tell users their top album, a feature it has not had in recent iterations, which contrasts with other platforms including Apple Music’s replay which ranks users’ most-played albums of the year.
This year, new features for Spotify Wrapped included an AI podcast that breaks down a user’s listening habits, as well as a user’s “music evolution,” though some social media users say they pale in comparison to previous features like a user’s listening personality and the “sound town” feature that told users last year which city aligned with their music taste.
The “music evolution” assigns users phrases to describe their listening habits in particular months—like “Pink Pilates Princess Strut Pop” and “Surf Crush Beach Reggae”—which some users criticized for sounding nonsensical.
This year also marked the longest wait in years for Spotify Wrapped, with the Dec. 4 release landing nearly a week after the late November releases of 2023 and 2022 and the Dec. 1 releases of 2021 and 2020.
Forbes has reached out to Spotify for comment.
Chief Critics
Many social media users voiced their displeasure with this year’s Wrapped edition in the comments section of Spotify’s recent Instagram post announcing Wrapped had been released. “I’m sorry but wtf was that??” one of the top comments states, liked more than 5,000 times. Another user said, “so boring this year. Was expecting something interesting,” while another stated “we need top albums and genres,” claiming Apple Music’s replay feature was better than Spotify’s this year. In one post on X liked more than 100,000 times, a disappointed user said, “spotify wrapped flopped this year so bad like where are the music cities, the playlists, the top genres or the listening auras… all that wait for WHAT,” comparing this year’s version unfavorably to features available in previous iterations. “This has to be fake this is actually the worst spotify wrapped ever in terms of graphics and data all included,” another X user said, garnering 28,000 likes. A TikTok user posted a video, liked more than 353,000 times, stating “this was actually one of Spotify’s worst wraps. Like it’s so obviously AI. They couldn’t even bother to include top genre like they have for YEARS.”
Key Background
Spotify tends to include new features with each Wrapped edition—which this year includes the AI podcast and “music evolution”—but features exclusive to previous years have gone viral online and seemed to be better received by users. Last year, Spotify told users what their “sound town” is, a city their listening habits most closely aligned with, which prompted users to compare their towns and investigate why they were assigned a particular city. On last year’s Wrapped release day, cities like Burlington, Vermont, and Berkeley, California, trended as many LGBTQ users theorized these towns correlated with queer artists and listeners. Others joked they felt left out by getting seemingly less popular cities like Flagstaff, Arizona, and Madison, Wisconsin. Features released in previous years include a user’s listening aura and listening personalities inspired by the Meyers-Briggs personality test.
Surprising Fact
Spotify laid off 17% of its workforce in December 2023, the biggest of three rounds of layoffs for the streaming platform last year. CEO Daniel Ek said at the time “economic growth has slowed dramatically” and “Spotify is not an exception to these realities,” stating the company would undergo a “strategic reorientation.”
News Peg
Spotify Wrapped became available to users Wednesday morning. The streaming platform announced Taylor Swift was the most-streamed artist of the year, and her album “The Tortured Poets Department” was the year’s biggest album. Sabrina Carpenter’s “Espresso” was this year’s most-streamed song, while Joe Rogan was the biggest podcaster.
Further Reading
Spotify Wrapped Is Out: Here’s How To Access It—As Taylor Swift Reigns As Top Artist (Forbes)