Spotify—one of Apple's main rivals in both the latter's services strategy and in antitrust investigations—has released a new version of its iPhone app that supports home screen widgets, one of the flagship features of iOS 14.
The app will also be your primary way to add more than one device if, say, you buy a second Chromecast for the upstairs bedroom. The app itself is free, which is good because you need it to setup. With the 4.1 app update today, you should be able to use Chromecast with the Spotify iOS app. If you have the first Chromecast that came out, you will have to wait for Google to release a firmware update so that is becomes compatible with Spotify. I heard that the firmware update will take a few weeks to finish rollout. So hopefully by the end of October you will be able to use Spotify with your Chromecast. Users can now initiate a Chromecast stream directly from Spotify’s Mac and Windows desktop apps, as first reported by 9to5Google. Although users have always been able to control Chromecast streams that were initiated from the iOS and Android apps through Spotify Connect, you now have the ability to initiate streams straight from the desktop apps. The new functionality is available in the desktop app version 1.1.38. You can use a Chromecast with Spotify to turn your television into a personalized jukebox, with album art an even lyrics displayed on the screen. To cast your Spotify account to a Chromecast. Jul 30, 2020 You can use Spotify directly on your TV using Chromecast and any other device you primarily use Spotify on other than your TV. Spotify on Chromecast works with Spotify apps on iOS, Android, Mac, Windows, and on the web; meaning you can cast music and podcasts via the service on your Chromecast device from your phone or your computer. One of the highest rated posts on Spotify's own community forum is titled 'Add support for Google Chromecast,' a clear indicator of not only how much this feature is desired, but also of Spotify's lack of care for it. Remaining consistent with statements made in the past, Spotify is firm in their decision to not pursue Chromecast support at this time—or maybe ever—thanks to a deal with.
Last month's release of iOS 14 brought home screen widgets—previously only the domain of iPads and Android phones—to iPhones. As we noted in our iOS 14 review, the value of the feature depends entirely on strong adoption and clever uses by third-party app developers.
Releases of widget-supporting apps from developers have been slow. Part of that was because Apple launched iOS 14 with less notice to developers than usual, meaning many were racing to play catch-up. But even now, a month later, the roster of widget-supporting apps has only grown a little.Spotify is one of the most high-profile apps on the App Store, and it finally made the jump with version 8.5.80 of its iOS app. Unfortunately, the new widget isn't all that powerful or useful. It essentially does the exact same thing the Music widget does: it shows a list of recently played songs or playlists that you can tap into from the home screen.
Tapping an entry doesn't just take you to the song in the app—it starts playing it right away, saving you an extra tap. Many users will wish they could customize what appears in the list or that they could control playback, as they currently can in the Android widget. As the setup stands now, the widget offers no customization options at all.
Some app developers (like Spark) have found creative ways to use the somewhat limited iOS widgets API (WidgetKit) to offer multiple, flexible uses of that precious home screen real estate. But users have said a lot of widgets just aren't that useful at the moment.
Those same users might wonder why we're not seeing essentially fully working slices of apps appearing on the home screen. Apple is likely to expand what developers can do with WidgetKit in future software releases, but there will always be some big limitations because of an emphasis on maintaining battery life.Lots of interactivity and live data from multiple apps on the home screen could have a negative impact there—that's probably why Apple and many devs have generally been conservative in terms of making widgets ultra-powerful.
By contrast, the Android Spotify widget offers playback control. But Spotify actually removed that comparatively powerful widget in August of last year, only to reintroduce an improved version of it shortly afterward when users complained. The brief removal led to a plethora of user-made widgets to replace the lost functionality.
But at least Spotify is supporting widgets on iPhones at all—that wasn't a foregone conclusion.
Listing image by Samuel Axon
Currently I’ve been trying out Rdio because it’s officially available in my country and the plans are super cheap. $2 for unlimited ad-free listening and mobile offline access? Yes please, I’ll have some of that.
But the more I use Rdio, the more I miss Spotify. Even when I was using the free plan via Hola Unblocker on the web, I liked it better because of the UI, easier controls, better playlist support, and a great plugin library.
Even the Android and iOS apps look pale in comparison to Spotify apps. But one thing Rdio does have going for itself is native Chromecast support. Spotify seems to be working on its own standard for streaming to connected devices, so it looks like Chromecast support isn’t coming anytime soon.
But if you’re an Android user, you can get the same functionality using a third party app.
Setting up Spotify
First, you’ll need to download the Spotify app. Log in, go to Settings and turn on Device Broadcast Status.
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Setting up Spoticast
Download Spoticast and log in with your Spotify credentials.
Choose the connected and active Chromecast from the Cast button on the top-right corner of the screen.
Spotify, Meet Chromecast
Now that both apps are up and running, go to Spotify and start playing something. It’ll be played on the Chromecast.
Customizing Spoticast Settings
Take a peak in the Settings menu by tapping the button in the bottom-right corner.
Cool Tip: Turn on Auto Mute. You might have noticed that when you play a song, it plays on both your device and Chromecast. Turning on
Auto Mute will make sure that your device volume is automatically muted.Spoticast is using your Spotify account details to basically act as a third party app. It’s using the Device Broadcast Status to know which song you’re playing, whether it’s paused and how far along you are. Then Spoticast is streaming another copy of the song to Chromecast.
This is why Spoticast will need you to log in every time. You can tell it to remember your password but it prompts you saying the password is saved in an unencrypted file. This is something you really shouldn’t do.
There’s also an option to Autologin if the session is saved and to Auto Launch Spotify once you’re connected with Spoticast.
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Are you a fan of Spotify? What’s your favorite feature? Let us know in the comments below.
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