You Can Now Share Spotify Songs on Your Instagram Stories
When you really like a song you’re listening to, you might want to share it on your Story. But the default result can be disappointing: When sharing via Spotify, for example, you can share the album art, song title, and artist name, but you can’t hear the song itself. If you want to share audio, you’ll need to use Instagram’s built-in music feature, not the Spotify extension.
That’s changing this week: Spotify now lets you share audio snippets in Instagram Stories. The company announced the new integration on Thursday , and it’s pretty simple. When you share a song from Spotify to your Instagram Story (tap the share button on a Spotify song, then select Stories with the Instagram logo), your Instagram app will open a new Story with the album art for the song you selected. You’ll also hear a snippet of the song playing over your Story. Of course, Spotify is all about engagement, so the feature comes with a sticker that lets viewers of your Story open the song in their own Spotify app.
It’s a small but welcome change for Spotify users, some of whom have been asking for the integration for years. This post on the Spotify subreddit is dated April 2021, so some Spotify fans who are also Instagram users will likely be pleased.
Publish music in real time to Instagram Notes
As part of this announcement, Spotify is also launching the ability to share music you’re listening to in real time in Instagram Notes. Notes lets you post short messages to your direct messages feed, and now your Notes will update every time you listen to music on Spotify. To set this up, create a Note in Instagram, then tap the music icon. Tap Connect Spotify and follow the on-screen instructions to connect your account.
Spotify says that if you’re already listening to music, your note will update immediately. If not, it will show the next song you’ll listen to in the next 30 minutes. You can also share a specific song you’re listening to in the Notes app. This works the same as posting to a story, but with the Notes option selected.
I don’t use Instagram notes (or Stories, for that matter), but even if I did, I’m not sure I’d feel comfortable sharing my music listening experiences in real time with all of my Instagram followers. I understand the urge to share your new favorite song, but I listen to so much different music that I don’t need all of my Instagram friends to know every track I have playing.