You Can Now Jazz up Your Spotify Playlist Covers

Spotify has released a new feature in its mobile app for iOS and Android that makes it easy to customize cover artwork for the playlists you've created.

To use it, open any playlist you’ve created on Spotify, then touch the three-dotted menu and choose “Create cover art.” If you don’t see this option yet, try manually updating your installed copy of Spotify on the App Store or Play Store instead of waiting for automatic updates to kick in, which can take days. The new option is available for English-speaking users in 65 markets, and you don’t need a paid Spotify Premium subscription to take advantage of it.

You’ve long been able to personalize your own Spotify playlists by uploading custom images using the desktop and mobile apps, but the new feature is a much more developed version. You can customize any uploaded image using built-in creative tools, which include layering options, effects, and basic editing capabilities such as cropping, rotating, and resizing. Once your custom image has been uploaded, you can add some text with various text styles, colors, and effects, as well as change the background color or apply a color gradient. For other creative possibilities, try image masking, built-in visual effects, or stickers.

Spotfy

“Once complete, your playlist will be updated with your new cover art, and you can share your creation directly with friends or on social media platforms,” according to Spotify. You can also create multiple covers for a playlist, but you’ll need to make a copy of the playlist first by opening the three-dotted menu and choosing Add to other playlist > New playlist.

To showcase the new feature, Spotify has partnered up with music artists and visual creators like Clairo, Jamie xx, and Arlo Parks, as well as Ugly Primo, who designed Bad Bunny’s Un Verano Sin Ti album cover, and Cey Adams, who has designed albums and logos for The Notorious B.I.G and Beastie Boys. These artists have crafted unique cover art for some of their playlists, which you can now check out on Spotify.

The new feature has some drawbacks. For example, you can’t edit your custom playlist cover once saved. There are no drafts at the moment. Also, each new cover you create overwrites the previous one for that playlist. That's understandable because the new cover art creator is currently in beta, meaning Spotify will continue to add new features over time.

Apple Music also lets you upload an image to use as a playlist cover or pick between ready-made generic designs, but it lacks the breadth of Spotify’s offering. YouTube Music has had a similar feature since 2023 that takes advantage of artificial intelligence, allowing you to create custom playlist covers from preselected themes and prompt elements.

Source: Spotify