Spotify can remove tracks from taste profiles and improve recommendations

Spotify announced on Wednesday that it will launch a new feature that will give users more control over their recommendations. The service allows users to exclude certain tracks from affecting their taste profiles. This taste profile refers to the streamer’s personal musical preferences and sense of interest, promoting Spotify recommendations, including discovery weekly, homepage selection, annual rap experiences, and blend playlists with friends.

The company previously provided a way for users to exclude certain playlists from their taste profiles, but this did not solve the overall issue of having music that didn’t really affect Spotify’s recommendations. Rather, the playlist feature was more convenient, such as preventing sleep music from leading to newer ages and white noise suggestions.

This new option allows you to move through recently played items and tell Spotify that there are some songs you’re playing but don’t actually like them. (Parents are happy everywhere!)

To use this feature, both free and premium users can tap on the three dots in the top right corner of the screen after selecting the songs to be excluded. Users can choose to exclude songs from their taste profiles or include songs that have been previously excluded.

Spotify’s superpersonalization has been an important sales point for the service for many years. However, there are many scenarios in which all intakes that listen to the algorithm make no sense. Families, especially those with small children, come to mind immediately. Users also often share Spotify accounts in the car with friends and family, allowing others to play DJs. With the growing number of smart speakers in the home, some members of the household are now the default Spotify account holders that are relevant to everyone’s preferences.

Given a wide range of scenarios, manually filtering out tracks is a great workaround, but it’s not the best solution. Ideally, users listen frequently while driving, so using voice commands makes it easier to switch profiles. Alternatively, the app can provide a way to tap on how to associate an entire listening session with one family, rather than forcing them to run songs one by one.

Either way, this feature offers some reliance on at least those who are eager to envelop Spotify, which has not been ruined by children’s music.