Spotify is removing its Car View feature. Here’s why that’s not a bad thing

I’m an avid user of Spotify—especially when I’m in my car. So, I’m all too familiar with the Car View feature that shows up whenever I connect my phone to my car’s Bluetooth. But now, Spotify confirms that they are “retiring” Car View. It might seem like it’s getting rid of an important safety feature, but here’s why I think it’s good that they’re getting rid of it.

If you’re not familiar with Car View for Spotify, it’s basically an added safety feature on the app aimed to make the app for “driver-friendly”. Once you’ve connected your phone with your car through Bluetooth or a cord in your car, the app will show you the “Car View” version of the track interface. it includes big and simple buttons for next, back, pause, play, shuffle and like.

To turn the feature off, press the car icon on the top right on the interface. Press “Turn off car view” to switch it off until your next drive. Spotify also tells you of the option to switch it off permanently through Settings. I still have Car View available on my own iPhone device right now, but the removal should be rolling out soon.

I get the idea of making the app more “driver-friendly”, but I personally found “Car View” very irritating. First of all, if you’re driving, you shouldn’t be on your phone at all anyway. So, creating a feature to make it “safer” for drivers to use the app seems a bit contradictory.

Second of all, when I do look at the Spotify app in my car (ehem… stopped and somewhere safe, of course) I can never get over how different the interface is compared to the regular non-“Car View” interface. Instead of me knowing where a button automatically is, I have to spend a few seconds trying to figure out where the repeat button is (newsflash… there isn’t one on the “Car View” interface).

In the end, I would switch off “Car View” almost every time. I honestly didn’t even see that Spotify added a small fine print note saying that I can toggle off the option in Settings… because why would I read any fine print if I’m in my car?

Hopefully, by getting rid of the flawed “Car View” feature, Spotify will be able to figure out a better and probably safer feature to replace it with. Currently, there are no plans to replace it with anything quite yet.

“We can confirm that we’re retiring the car view feature. This however doesn’t mean we don’t want to improve on how our users listen to Spotify while driving. On the contrary, we’re actively exploring a variety of new ways to deliver the best in-car listening experience. Think of retiring car-view as something that needs to happen in an effort to make way for new innovations coming down the track,” wrote a Spotify moderator.

Meanwhile, Spotify suggests that users can use the app in the car hands-free via Google Assistant. iPhone users can also use Siri for the same thing.

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