How to Make Alexa Play Your Spotify Playlist – Step-by-Step Guide

Alexa and the Spotify music streaming service go together to create an immense experience for their users. Users who own most Alexa-enabled speakers (Every Amazon Echo speaker supports Spotify integration) can integrate Spotify as the default music library and listen to their favorite songs and playlists.

If you just bought your Amazon Echo speaker or chose Spotify as your music service but don’t know how to connect Spotify with your Alexa and play your favorite songs/playlist, this guide will help you to figure it out.

Plus, we will walk you through some commands and things you should avoid if you want to make Alexa play your Spotify playlist, without running into issues.

At the end of this guide, we will give you some solutions if Alexa won’t play your music playlist on Spotify and some common issues users like you have encountered when integrating Spotify with Alexa. Keep reading…

Step 01 – Connect your Spotify account with Alexa

Before you start playing your Spotify playlist using Alexa, you need to integrate the service with your Alexa account. To do this, you need to have installed the Alexa app on your smartphone, and logged into your Amazon account.

One thing we should make clear is people keep asking on forums and communities that if they can integrate the free version of Spotify with Alexa. If you have the same question, then keep no doubt because you can integrate your free Spotify account with Alexa, without any problem.

With that said, let’s see how you can link your Spotify account with Alexa. Follow these steps;

1. Open the Alexa app on your smartphone

2. Tap on the More/Hamburger menu icon at the bottom left of your screen

3. On the menu, tap on Settings

4. Under settings, you should see the option called “Music and podcasts.” Tap on it

5. You will see Amazon music is currently listed there. To start linking your Spotify account, tap on the “Link new service” option

6. Now you will see top music streaming services. Tap on Spotify

7. Now you will be redirected to the Spotify skill. Tap on the “ENABLE TO USE” button

8. Then it will take you to the Spotify login page. Enter your account details and sign into your account

9. Once you are logged in, you will be asked to agree to let Alexa access your Spotify account. Tap on the Agree button once you read what Alexa has access to

10. If the account linking is successful, you will see a message

 

Okay. Now you have successfully linked your Spotify account with Alexa. So what’s up now? Can you just say, “Alexa, play [your playlist name] on Spotify”? Or do you have something else to do prior to that? 

Yes, you should be aware of what you can command and cannot command to your Alexa when playing music or an entire playlist on Spotify. So let’s learn what those are.

Step 02 – Set Spotify as your default streaming service

This step is a lot useful because once you do this, you do not have to say, “Alexa play [your playlist name] on Spotify” every time you want to play a song or a playlist on your Spotify account. Instead, you could just say;

“Alexa, play [your playlist name],” and Alexa will automatically search and play the playlist or music on your Spotify account. 

That is convenient, right? So lets’ see how you can do that;

1. Open your Alexa app

2. Tap on the More/Menu icon

3. Go to Settings

4. Tap on music and podcasts

5. Then, tap on “Default services”

6. Now, under the Music section, tap on the “Change” option and select Spotify

7. Now exit from the app

Note: You can also select Spotify as the default for “Artist and genre stations” as well as “Podcasts” if you prefer.

Once you are finished with setting up default services, give a restart to your Alexa speaker to make sure it is ready to serve Spotify music as you command.

Step 03 – Make Alexa play your Spotify playlist

Now you can try saying, “Alexa, play

,” and see if Alexa can understand what you say and play the playlist you requested. 

Note that you shouldn’t say, “Alexa, play my

,” or “Alexa, play my favorite

.” Giving commands like this can confuse the AI assistant, and you will not get the result you intended.

If the Alexa still fails or gives you a response like “Sorry, I cannot understand you,” then either your Alexa actually cannot actually understand what you say (slow down, and say it again), or there is something wrong with the playlist. Let us explain.

Alexa won’t play my playlist!

There can be several reasons why Alexa won’t play your playlist on Spotify. To start troubleshooting, make sure;

1. You successfully linked the Spotify account with Alexa
2. You have set Spotify as the default music streaming service

If you are sure about these two, then you can continue with the following solutions;

Solution 01 – Rename your playlist

If you have renamed your playlist on Spotify as a generic name like “Hip hop” or “Jazz,” then Alexa won’t be able to distinguish those words from actual music genres on Spotify. Therefore, you have to rename your playlist first.

To do this, you can follow these instructions;

1. Open the Spotify app on your smartphone, then tap on Your Library (at the bottom right)

2. Tap on Playlists

3. From the playlists you have created, tap on the playlist you want to rename

4. Tap on three dots beneath the playlist thumbnail (see the image below)

5. Tap on Edit playlist from the popup you get

6. Then, tap on the playlist name at the top, and rename it

7. Once you are done renaming the playlist, tap on the Save button to save the playlist

Once you are done, ask Alexa to play the renamed playlist and see if it works.

Solution 02 – Use the Alexa app to play your playlist

This might not be the best solution, but you can use the Alexa app to easily play your favorite playlists on Spotify, without having zero issues.

All you have to do is;

1. Open the Alexa app

2. Tap on Play at the bottom

3. Look at the “Spotify playlist” section and tap on the playlist you want to play

Conclusion

That is it! You can also restart your Echo speaker if you face issues with playing a playlist on your Spotify account. To finish up the guide, let us show you some useful commands you can use when controlling your music experience with Alexa and Spotify.

General commands:

• “Alexa, play.”
• “Alexa, stop.”
• “Alexa, pause.”
• “Alexa, resume the song.”
• “Alexa, stop shuffle.”
• “Alexa, louder / quieter.”
• “Alexa, volume up / down.”
• “Alexa, set volume to level [number].”

When playing a specific song (by title, artist, or genre):

• “Alexa, play [title / artist / album].”
• “Alexa, play [song] by [artist] on [device / speaker group].”
• “Alexa, play [genre].”

To play/shuffle playlists:

• “Alexa, play .”
• “Alexa, shuffle .”

To fine-tune your music experience:

• “Alexa, set the treble to [number].”
• “Alexa, increase bass.”
• “Alexa, decrease treble.”
• “Alexa, increase bass in [speaker group].”
• “Alexa, set bass to [number] on [device].”

If you have any questions regarding this guide, leave a comment below. 

Have a nice day!

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