Widgets are still alive and well on the music-lover’s phone.
What you need to know
- Spotify removed the widget from its Android app in August.
- Users revolted, calling for the widget to return and saying that notification controls aren’t enough.
- Spotify now says the widget will be coming back in a upcoming release, with some new improvements.
There are few things that are constant on my home screen, but a music widget is one of them, and so I understand all too well the furor that arose when Spotify removed its music widget from the Android app last month. Spotify said that with notification controls and lock screen controls, the widget was redundant and no longer needed, something many users took issue with.
After speaking their minds in forum threads over the last three weeks, Spotify has now confirmed that not only is the widget coming back in an upcoming Android app update, it’s coming back with some new improvements:
We value your input and ideas, and wanted to let you know that we have made some improvements to the performance and visuals of the Android Widget. We will be reinstating it in an upcoming release on Android.
If you can’t wait for the widget to come back — or you just prefer music widgets that can change their look according to your theme — do what I do and go third-party! KWGT and KLWP have many an option out there for you to use, and my favorite pre-formed widget pack is Melodi for Kustom which contains many great widgets such as the darling bubble widget above. It’s not quite as detailed as the Spotify widget, but it’s also ten times prettier and works with any music app on your phone thanks to KWGT’s notification interaction permission.
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