Since I originally wrote this post, Spotify have listened to their users, and restored their ‘set the same volume level for all tracks’ option to the Advanced Preferences of their desktop app.
- Spotify Volume Changes App Download
- Spotify Volume Changes On Its Own Web Player
- Spotify Volume Changes App Itunes
A group of software companies including Match Group, Spotify Technology, and Epic Games have created an advocacy group to push for changes in app stores that distribute their content, with a. The process to ‘boost’ the volume in Spotify on Android is a bit different than it is for iOS. Here how to do it on your Android device – In order for the volume adjustment to work, first you’ll need to pause any currently playing tracks. Then tap the Your Library icon from the bottom navigation bar. If you want to use controls specific to Spotify (e.g. Volume up/down for Spotify only), there's a list of them here. However, you have to be in the Spotify app to be able to do this. If you want to assign hotkeys which work outside the app, you need to use a third-party app such as Toastify and AutoHotkey. Hope that helps ? P. As things change and morph over time, it circles back to key points and offers second chances. Volumes find themselves at such a point in 2020. After four years apart, the group—Myke Terry vocals, Raad Soudani bass, and Nick Usich drums—reconvenes with original vocalist Michael Barr.
And that’s good news, because:
- It means that Spotify users care about loudness
- They said so, and
- Spotify have listened to them.
Spotify Volume Changes App Download
All you need to do to take advantage of this improvement is update to the latest version and restart Spotify.
BUT…
We’re not out of the woods yet.
Because Spotify’s implementation of normalisation still sucks, big-time could still be improved – that’s why getting why this preference option back was so important.
To find out what I mean, why this post is still here, and what you can do about it, read on.
Update – May 2017
Great news – it seems that Spotify have reduced their playback loudness level !
If so, it may be time to finally remove this post – but a few questions remain. Mainly, is the limiter still in use ? Until this is answered, I’ll leave the post here.
Meanwhile, read on by all means, but bear in mind that the playback level is now -14 LUFS, which is a big improvement. For all the details, click here.
So far, so good !
What is volume normalisation, anyway ?
Volume normalisation is everywhere, it’s here to stay, and will ultimately make the Loudness Wars a regrettable footnote in music history – I hope.
All it means is that the audio we listen to is automatically played back at a consistent level, so we don’t have to keep reaching for the volume control. Because big variations in loudness are always the number one cause of complaints.
Spotify does it, iTunes Radio does it, and now YouTube does it.
So far, so familiar. But recently, more and more people had been asking
Where did Spotify’s ‘set the same volume level for all tracks’ option go ?
This is the option in Spotify’s preferences that allows you to decide if you want volume normalisation on or not.
And for a while, they removed it.
Actually, that’s misleading. The functionality was still there, and it was enabled by default for new users – all that happened was that the preference option was removed, for a while.
The good news is that the preference is back, albeit hidden away in the Advanced section. But you may still be asking…
What’s the problem ?
In a nutshell – Spotify’s implementation of this feature has several big problems.
- Its reference level is too loud. Spotify has a similar problem to YouTube – the level it chooses to normalise everything to is too loud. The effect is slightly different, though. In order to provide consistent loudness, Spotify adds extra limiting to more dynamic music, and unfortunately…
- Spotify’s limiter sucks. And it pumps, and it crunches – all the things you don’t want to happen to your favourite dynamic music
- It has no “album mode”. Apple’s Sound Check does, and that’s important – I wrote about why, here
The solution
The solution to these problems is simple, if not completely satisfactory.
For casual “shuffle” listening, you can enable Spotify’s ‘set the same volume level for all tracks’ option – and put up with some pretty crass limiting on more dynamic material, unfortunately.
If you want to listen to a whole album with the internal dynamics intact and no extra limiting, you can disable it.
A bit of a pain, but not the end of the world.
Things could still be better, though.
Where does this leave us ?
Volume normalisation is a great thing, but it needs to be done right.
Apple’s Sound Check currently leads the pack, with a sensible choice of reference level, working album mode and no low-quality limiting for very dynamic material.
Spotify on the other hand, has a way to go yet. Happily they did the right thing and restored the ‘volume normalisation’ option to the program’s preferences, but that still doesn’t help with the unnecessarily loud playback volume, the lack of album mode, or the crude limiting when the option is enabled.
Take action
Spotify have an active user forum, and to their credit, they listen to what people say. So let’s tell them these are issues we care about !
To vote for my suggestion to reduce the reference volume level, and stop using the limiter, click here.
To vote for the addition of a working “album mode”, add “Kudos” here.
Spotify listened to us about the volume Preference option, hopefully they’ll listen about these other issues, too.
Please tell your friends !
Postscript – The Hack (no longer needed)
This section of the post is irrelevant now, but for those who are interested, here’s the fix from the original post. It was even more of a pain than the old Preferences option, but at least it worked.
On a Mac, this fix is pleasingly simple. On a PC… less so.
The hack on a Mac
- Copy and paste this text into the Search box in the Finder:
audio.normalize_v2= - Click the “plus” button on the right near “Save” and then select “System Files” “Are included” from the drop-down menus on the left.
- Double-click on the “prefs” file which appears in the results – it should open in TextEdit. If not, you can open TextEdit yourself, and drag the file into it’s window.
- Look for the line with the same text as above –
audio.normalize_v2=
If you don’t see one, paste it in. - If you do want Spotify to normalise music replay volumes, add the word true after the equals sign
- If you don’t want Spotify to normalise music replay volumes, add the word false after the equals sign
- Save the file
- Re-start Spotify
That’s it ! Volume normalisation will now be enable or disabled, depending on whether you chose “true” or “false”
The hack on Windows
- Copy and paste this text into the Search box at the top of My Computer:
%AppData%Spotifyusers - You should see results listing all the user accounts on your computer – double-click on the one you’re using for Spotify. You’ll see a list of files which almost certainly won’t include one called “prefs” (See, I told you it wasn’t as easy on a PC!)
- So, right-click in some empty space and choose New > Text Document from the menu
- In the empty file that opens up, paste the text
audio.normalize_v2=true (to enable volume normalisation) or
audio.normalize_v2=false (to disable it). - Save the file as “prefs.txt” and quit TextEdit
- Rename the file “prefs.txt” to just “prefs”. You’ll get an error message asking if you’re sure – click Yes.
- Re-start Spotify
That’s it ! Once again, volume normalisation will now be enable or disabled, depending on whether you chose “true” or “false”
Making it easier in future
Luckily you don’t have to repeat all these steps every time.
On Mac, right-click on the “prefs” file and select “Make Alias”. On PC, right-click and choose “Create Shortcut”. You can put the resulting files on your desktop or anywhere convenient, and in future when you want to change Spotify’s volume normalisation setting you can just open them up and edit the value to say “true” or “false” as needed. You may need to specify to open the file with TextEdit on PC, but it’s not the end of the world. It’s also safe to rename the shortcut/alias files if you prefer.
![Spotify volume changes on its own web player Spotify volume changes on its own web player](/uploads/1/3/3/9/133914586/144351578.png)
[Credit where it’s due – I found the Mac hack for this here, and the easiest way to apply the PC hack here.]
Spotify is one of the largest music streaming services around the world with more than 140 million users. Although Spotify is equipped with lots of amazing features, it is unavoidable that you may encounter more or less Spotify problems. In this article, I would like to list some of those issues that may occur more frequently than others and show you the way to fix them.
1. Spotify Cannot Start
This problem will appear when you try to launch your Spotify after installing but just find it is crashed. It seems that this issue has troubled users for times, therefore, I will provide you with the solution below:
(1) After downloading the Spotify Installer, save it to your computer.
(2) Start the installer then select Properties.
(3) Choose 'Compatibility', check the box of 'Run this program in compatibility mode for:' and select 'Windows XP (Service Pack 3)'.
(4) Click Apply.
2. Spotify Failure to Stream
You have already collected or bought songs with a premium account but it appears a box of 'Can't play the current track' or 'You're offline' while you are totally online. In many cases, these Spotify streaming errors are resulting from your home network or your device. Follow the steps to fix this problem:
(1) Open the Airplane mode of your device and then turn it off.
(2) Reopen the device you use to stream Spotify.
(3) Reinsert the wireless router.
(4) Unplug the modem from your Internet for 30 to 60 seconds.
(5) Put the router to a higher place to secure the WiFi router not covered by other items.
3. Spotify Stuttering
You may come across with the problem that you can listen to Spotify music but it is intermittent, which makes you crazy.
For Windows and Mac, you need to open Spotify Settings and choose 'Edit > Preference > Enable hardware acceleration'. If it fails, uninstall Spotify and install this program again. For iPhone or Android, try logging out and back in at first. If it fails, restart the device and try again. Or you need to delete the app and reinstall.
4. Spotify Cannot Connect
There probably exists that you are able to use other apps and visit websites but just cannot connect to Spotify. The solution is as below.
(1) Make sure you can connect to cellular data when disconnecting to WiFi, which narrows the problem.
(2) Force close the Spotify and restart it.
(3) If step (2) fails, restart your device.
(4) Log out the Spotify account and log in again, or you can uninstall it and reinstall directly.
5. Delete Spotify Playlists Accidentally
Very often you may carelessly delete a Spotify playlist. Well, you can use the Spotify website to recover it.
Login the Spotify account and then click on 'Recover playlists > Restore'. There will not appear one playlist you deleted right now but in the future. Next time you enter this page, click 'Restore' to recover it to your account.
6. Spotify No Sound
When you open Spotify and want to play music now and then, but just find that there is no sound coming out. Check out the following method to the solution.
(1) Check the volume of the Spotify on your device to make sure it is not muted.
(2) On Mac, you need to press the 'Option' and click on the 'Speaker' so as to connect the right output device.
(3) On iPhone or Android, ensure your system volume is up without connecting Bluetooth headphones. In addition, clear your headphone jack with compressed air to unclog them.
7. Remove Spotify Offline Devices
You may extract music from Spotify with a Premium account and keep music offline by downloading to your devices. However, there are three devices limited for you to keep Spotify music. So, how to remove an unused Spotify offline devices to clear a new space?
Enter your Spotify account page and click Remove to remove device out of the list. while for the offline device, you can only keep 3,333 songs or you may not be able to listen to music.
8. Cannot Add Local Files to A Playlist
You desire to add your own music in the Spotify playlists thus you can listen to it everywhere, follow the guide mentioned below and you can fix this trouble.
(1) Enter 'Edit (Windows) or Spotify (Mac) > Preferences > Local Files'.
(2) Search your iTunes files or your Music Library, or directly to the destination of your saved music.
(3) Add local files to your Spotify playlists.
9. Cannot Download Spotify Music for Offline Playback
Spotify Volume Changes On Its Own Web Player
You can download Spotify songs for offline playback but it just cannot under some circumstances.
First, you must be aware that there is a limitation of 3,333 songs for synchronization to each device, and for you exceeding the limits, you aren't able to download any more songs unless you delete some songs.
Second, open the 'Available Offline' switch will slowly delete its content, however, for fast solving this problem, you should delete the cache.
10. Cannot Add More Tracks to Your Music
There is a limitation on storing songs on Your Music so that you cannot add as many songs as you want. Some of you may be angry about that, but I want you to cool down and look for the following solution.
You are able to create a new playlist named 'Library' and add music you like there. After the 10,000 song limitation, you can create 'Library 2', 'Library 3' and so on. Add all of these libraries into File > New Playlist Folder, and you can see all the music within it.
In a word, there are 10 common Spotify problems and each of them has the method to fix. However, in order to avoid some unexpected issues, here I would like to recommend you to back up your Spotify Music with TuneFab Spotify Music Converter. If you want to listen to Spotify music at any time and everywhere or in case of the out of service for Spotify or unconnected to the Internet, TuneFab Spotify Music Converter is the best choice for you to listen to music easily.