Motorola’s Playlist Studio simply ruined Spotify’s algorithm for me

As a longtime Spotify consumer, there’s a lot that I really like in regards to the streaming large. It is aware of my music tastes higher than I do, and I begin shared jams virtually each time I hang around with my pals. But, I typically discover myself somewhat pissed off and considerably bored by my rigorously tuned algorithm — I just like the songs it picks, and it is aware of I like these songs, so it simply retains choosing the identical ones.

However now, there’s an AI-powered resolution on the desk, and it comes from an surprising place. Motorola simply launched the playlist generator I’ve been ready for, and I believe it simply may get me to rethink my relationship with Spotify. Right here’s why.

When OEMs resolve it’s lastly time to enter the AI race, they appear to take action with a well-recognized set of options. There are virtually at all times instruments that will help you write higher, hold you extra organized, and generate photographs based mostly on prompts or pictures of your loved ones and pals. Motorola is not any exception. It’s provide you with intelligent methods to take notes and voice recordings in your new Razr, and its Picture Studio falls proper within the candy spot between Google’s Pixel Studio and Samsung’s Portrait Studio.

Nevertheless, the function that I believe folks will like to make use of most is the Playlist Studio. It’s quite a bit like a picture generator in that you just feed it prompts and spit again creations, however as a substitute of a single picture (or a collection of photographs), you get a personalized playlist of round ten songs to stream and save.

Motorola’s go-to instance throughout our brief time with the Razr 2025 collection was to ask for “Y2K pizza occasion jams,” which could have been somewhat earlier than my time, however it’s arduous to argue with Beyonce’s Loopy in Love or Nelly’s Sizzling in Herre. I selected to not topic the briefing crowd to my most popular taste of unhappy music, however I absolutely plan to check the function additional as soon as I’ve time to dig deeper into the Razr Extremely in my day-to-day life.

In fact, Motorola isn’t the primary to create an AI-powered playlist generator. Spotify debuted one thing comparable in beta testing in early 2024 for subscribers within the UK and Australia earlier than finally increasing it to different English-speaking nations. I’ve since tried the function (which stays in beta testing), and it really works fairly nicely. Nevertheless, it falls into the identical drawback that almost all of my different Spotify playlists undergo: It already is aware of my tastes too nicely.

For instance, I pulled up Spotify’s AI Playlists menu, requested for “unhappy songs that would slot in the woods,” and acquired a playlist of 30 songs which can be virtually all on my Spotify-generated Moody Combine already, and I didn’t even must ask for that one. I won’t get as many songs at one time on Motorola’s aspect, however I’m weirdly grateful that the Playlist Studio goes in with out an thought of my style.

Sadly, there’s one sticking level to all of the neat issues I really like about Motorola’s Playlist Studio: It solely works with Amazon Music. Sure, that music streaming service that sits in a distant third place behind Spotify and Apple Music by way of how many individuals I do know who use it. I’ve a premium subscription due to my ongoing Amazon Prime membership, however I don’t assume I’ve ever touched the platform exterior of the few weeks I take advantage of a Fireplace pill every year.

So, which means I both have to present Amazon Music one other likelihood, belief Spotify to enhance its AI algorithm (my hopes aren’t excessive), or return and manually create all the things that the Playlist Studio cooks up by hand. For now, I believe I’ll wind up doing the latter, because it permits me to maintain my current podcast subscriptions, appreciated songs, and I’m already logged into Spotify on someplace close to 15 or 20 gadgets — not that I’m happy with that.

However actually, if Motorola actually needs to push folks to make use of its Playlist Studio — and I actually wish to use its Playlist Studio — it must open the function up a bit. Motorola packed its new Razrs with help for Copilot, Perplexity, Gemini, and its personal AI-powered options, so it ought to have the ability to export playlists to Spotify and YouTube Music on the very least. When that day comes, I’ll be more than pleased to generate and share playlists till you’re sick of them — after which I’ll even share a couple of extra.