How do I turn off smart shuffle?

What is Smart Shuffle?

Smart Shuffle is a new feature on Spotify that intelligently predicts what songs users will want to hear next when listening to playlists in shuffle mode. It was announced in March 2023 and rolled out to users shortly after (Source).

With Smart Shuffle enabled, Spotify will sprinkle in recommended songs from its entire catalog in between the tracks already on a playlist. This way, listening sessions stay fresh with some personalized discovery added in. The recommendations are chosen based on user taste preferences and listening history (Source).

The feature aims to strike a balance between playing songs the user already likes that are in a playlist while still mixing in variety to prevent repetitiveness. Smart Shuffle is on by default for Premium users in the shuffle mode, but it can be turned off if desired.

Why You Might Want to Turn Off Smart Shuffle

Spotify’s Smart Shuffle feature aims to provide a more tailored listening experience by analyzing your listening patterns and avoiding playing the same artists or songs too frequently. However, some users find Smart Shuffle frustrating for a few key reasons:

Smart Shuffle can sometimes get stuck repeating the same songs or artists over and over. As one Reddit user complained, “I keep hearing the same stuff over and over even though I have 600+ songs in [my] playlist” (Source). The algorithm doesn’t always feel as random as expected.

Smart Shuffle limits the variety of songs played. The feature intentionally avoids big jumps between genres or eras, which some find too restrictive. As one user put it, “I want to go from Frank Sinatra to System of a Down sometimes” (Source).

Some prefer true randomness rather than an adapted playlist flow. Smart Shuffle aims to create smooth transitions, but some users simply want the unexpectedness of shuffled playback.

Turning off Smart Shuffle returns control to the user and provides an experience some find more enjoyable and surprising. Just be aware it disables some of Spotify’s personalization features.

How to Turn Off Smart Shuffle on Mobile

Here are step-by-step instructions for turning off Smart Shuffle in the Spotify mobile app for iOS and Android devices:

Open the Spotify app on your mobile device.
Navigate to a playlist or album you want to listen to.
Tap the “Shuffle” icon at the bottom of the screen. It looks like two crossing arrows.

The icon should change from green with sparkles (indicating Smart Shuffle is on) to plain white (indicating standard shuffle).
Tap the icon again to turn shuffle off completely and play songs in playlist order.
You can also tap the “Now Playing” bar at the bottom to bring up playback controls. Toggle the “Shuffle” switch off.

This will disable Smart Shuffle for the current session. To permanently disable it:
1. Go to the Settings tab in the app.
2. Tap “Playback.”
3. Toggle “Smart Shuffle” to the off position.

Now when you play playlists and albums, Smart Shuffle will remain deactivated and songs will play in their original order by default. You can still manually turn shuffle on if desired.

Source: https://www.wikihow.com/Turn-Off-Smart-Shuffle-Spotify

How to Turn Off Smart Shuffle on Desktop

Here are step-by-step instructions for turning off Smart Shuffle in the Spotify desktop app:

Open the Spotify app on your desktop.

Select the playlist, album, or songs you want to play.
In the bottom left corner of the app, click the “Shuffle” icon. It looks like two crossing arrows.
The icon will change from green to white. This means Smart Shuffle is now turned off.

You can verify Smart Shuffle is off by checking that the songs play in their original order rather than shuffled.

If you want to turn Smart Shuffle back on, simply click the “Shuffle” icon again until it turns green. The Spotify desktop app will remember your Shuffle settings, so you don’t have to change them each time.

To permanently disable Smart Shuffle, you can go to Settings > Playback and toggle “Smart Shuffle” off. This will prevent playlists or albums from automatically shuffling when you click play.

How to Turn Off Smart Shuffle on Web Player

Here are step-by-step instructions for turning off Smart Shuffle in the Spotify web player:

Open the Spotify web player in your browser and start playing a playlist or album.

In the bottom left of the screen, click the “Shuffle” icon. It will be highlighted green if Smart Shuffle is on.
Keep clicking the Shuffle icon until the highlight disappears. This means Smart Shuffle is now off.
The playlist or album will now play in order rather than shuffled.

You can turn Smart Shuffle back on at any time by clicking the Shuffle icon until it highlights green again.

This method works both for Premium and free Spotify users. Turning off Smart Shuffle means you’ll hear tracks in their original order instead of Spotify’s algorithm picking the next song.[1]

Shuffle vs. Smart Shuffle

The main difference between standard shuffle and smart shuffle on Spotify is how the songs are selected when playing a playlist or album:

Standard Shuffle:

Randomly shuffles all songs in the playlist or album.
The playlist order is different each time you shuffle.

You hear the songs in the randomly generated order.

Smart Shuffle:

Shuffles your liked songs plus recommended tracks based on your listening history and taste profile (according to Spotify).

The recommended tracks are inserted between the playlist/album tracks.
Provides a more customized listening experience tailored to you.

So in standard shuffle mode, you only hear songs already in the playlist or album. With smart shuffle, Spotify adds recommended tracks in between based on your preferences and listening behavior. This leads to more variety and discovery of new artists/songs.

Some users prefer standard shuffle for playlists so they only hear the songs they intentionally added. Others like smart shuffle to find new music mixed into their playlists (according to this Reddit discussion). It comes down to personal taste.

Customizing Shuffle Settings

While you can’t completely disable Smart Shuffle, Spotify does provide some options to customize shuffle settings and get more variety in your shuffled playback:

Go to Settings > Playback and toggle on or off options like “Autoplay” and “Crossfade songs.” Turning these off can reduce repeats.

On mobile, tap the “Shuffle” icon on a playlist or album page and select “Shuffle +” to avoid shuffling in a strict order.
On desktop, right click a playlist name and select “Shuffle Play” then check “Shuffle+” for more variety.
Select multiple albums or playlists and shuffle them together to draw from a wider mix of songs.

Follow playlists like “Discover Weekly” and “Release Radar” that provide algorithmic suggestions.

While Smart Shuffle is designed to adapt to listening patterns, adjusting these settings can help add more randomness and variety based on your preferences.

Listening in Album Order

Many music fans prefer listening to albums straight through in their original track order rather than having songs shuffled randomly. Spotify’s default is to have Smart Shuffle enabled, which aims to create interesting yet cohesive playlists by grouping similar songs together. However, it’s easy to disable Smart Shuffle and play albums as the artist intended.

When listening to an album on mobile or desktop, simply click the “Shuffle” icon so it is no longer highlighted. This will turn off shuffling and play the songs in the original album order. You can also start playback of the album by clicking on the first track, which will play sequentially without shuffle.

On mobile, you can also go to the album page itself rather than a playlist, and click the “Play” button on the album cover. This will begin playing the album in order without having to change shuffle settings.

For Spotify’s web player, click on the album cover to bring up the album page. Then click the “Play” icon next to the album’s tracklist, which will play the songs in order.

Disabling Smart Shuffle is a quick way to enjoy your favorite albums as the artist intended. Just toggle the Shuffle option off whenever you want to hear the natural flow and story of an album.

Spotify Playlists Without Smart Shuffle

If you want to listen to playlists without Smart Shuffle, there are a couple options:

Find existing playlists created before Smart Shuffle – Playlists created before Smart Shuffle was introduced in 2022 will have regular shuffle instead. You can search Spotify for “old playlists” or “playlists without Smart Shuffle” to find some options. However, this limits you to older playlists.

Create your own playlist – Building your own playlist gives you full control. Add the songs yourself in the order you want rather than relying on Spotify’s algorithms. You can shuffle the songs normally when you want variety.

Use a third party app – Some third party apps like SmarterPlaylists allow you to turn off Smart Shuffle and use classic shuffle instead. However, this requires using an external app rather than Spotify’s native options.

Overall, creating your own playlists gives you the most flexibility if you want to avoid Smart Shuffle and control the shuffle behavior yourself. Searching for older playlists works too, but limits your options. Using a third party app gets around Smart Shuffle as well.

Summary

Here is a recap of the key steps covered to disable Spotify’s Smart Shuffle feature across platforms:

On mobile, go to Settings > Playback and toggle off Smart Shuffle.

On desktop, go to Settings > Playback and toggle off Smart Shuffle.
On web player, click the shuffle icon to switch from Smart Shuffle to regular Shuffle.

With Smart Shuffle disabled, songs will play in their default album or playlist order instead of Spotify’s algorithmic order. You can also customize shuffle behavior in Settings to only shuffle within playlists, albums, or turn off shuffling entirely.

Disabling Smart Shuffle gives you more control over the listening experience. Just remember you can easily turn it back on at any time if you want Spotify’s enhanced shuffle functionality.