Spotify removes ‘Car View’ from its mobile apps

Spotify has confirmed that it has removed Car View, a feature that presented a simplified Now Playing screen when connected to a vehicle’s entertainment system, from its mobile apps.

Android Police reports that Spotify users started noticing Car View was missing in mid-October. Those users questioned the removal of the feature in a community forum thread, prompting one of Spotify’s moderators to confirm that the company had said goodbye to Car View.

“That doesn’t mean, however, that we don’t want to improve the way our users listen to Spotify while driving,” Spotify’s forum moderator said. “Rather, we’re actively exploring a variety of new ways to deliver the best in-car listening experience. Consider the removal of car view as something that needs to happen in an effort to make way for new innovations to to come. .”

The moderator recommended using Google Assistant to control Spotify without manually navigating through the app while driving. In the meantime, the company is said to be working on some improvements to the use of its apps in the car, but it hasn’t said exactly what that means.

The removal of Car View from Spotify’s mobile apps follows the introduction of Car Thing, a device that pairs with the phones of Spotify Premium subscribers to allow them to control audio playback with voice commands, the built-in touchscreen and a dedicated volume button, in April.

It’s unclear whether the release of Car Thing influenced Spotify’s decision to remove Car View from its mobile apps, but as Android Police notes, “getting people to buy an $80 add-on for their giving access to features they already had isn’t great” even if the changes are actually unrelated.