Spotify

Spotify adds real-time lyrics on Android, Google TV; expands podcast support to more countries

Ben Schoon | Nov 18 2021 - 8:14 am PT

Following years of user demand for the feature, Spotify today announced that it would add support for real-time lyrics across its apps, including on Android and Google TV.

Revealed in a blog post, Spotify will start rolling out lyric support today, including on Android and Android TV/Google TV apps. The feature is powered by a leading source for song lyrics, MusixMatch, and appears to work for just about every song. In one playlist of over 400 songs, we found only one that wasn’t supported.

Lyrics are one of the most requested features from listeners across the globe. So after iterating and testing, we’ve created an experience that’s simple and interactive – and even shareable. By partnering with Musixmatch, we’re bringing song lyrics to life through in-app access across the majority of our extensive library of tracks.

Viewing lyrics on a mobile device shows a scrolling card that has the current lyrics highlighted. You can also share the lyrics as an image.

On Android and other mobile devices, lyrics appear at the bottom of the screen with a swipe gesture revealing the lyrics. Each song is marked with “lyrics” to show whether or not the feature is supported. Meanwhile, on TVs, lyrics are enabled using an on-screen toggle on the Now Playing screen. Spotify explicitly confirmed the feature is supported on Android TV/Google TV, with lyrics also appearing on PlayStation and Xbox consoles, Fire TV, Roku, and select other TV devices.

This feature is available on both paid and free accounts.

Meanwhile, Spotify also announced this week that it would be bringing support for podcasts to more countries. Specifically, it was confirmed that users in Iraq, Libya, Tajikistan, Venezuela, the Republic of the Congo, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo would start seeing podcasts on Spotify.