Spotify For Linux

By a long shot, Spotify is the best music streaming service. You can use it on your Android phone, your web browser, or your Windows or Mac computer. It is also available for Linux desktop use (sort of). ​

Spotify snap now available to download

Spotify team released snap package for Linux. A team of developers works on the Spotify Linux client in their spare time. Spotify website suggests that the experience might not be the same as other Spotify clients. But, it’s better than not having anything officially. Snap applications can be run on any Linux distribution.

Simply download the client

Command line option –

snap install spotify

The official Spotify client is available but there are few issues that you must know before you install it.

The Linux client is described as follows on Spotify’s website: “This version is unsupported.” So what has happened is that the Linux client was developed in the spare time of some interested developers, and it has relied on the goodwill of these developers to provide, support, and update the Linux desktop client.

The Spotify client for Linux is no longer in active development. Yup, and it hasn’t been for over a year now. A revelation was made in March 2016 that there have been no developers working on the Linux client for the 5 previous months.

There is no plans to fix all the bugs that have been associated with the Linux client. Even though the app will be receiving updates, only some of the bugs are going to be tackled, and even if there is going to be a fix, there’s no knowing when it will be available.

There is no one working on Linux specific features. So unless a feature added to other desktop clients (Mac and Ubuntu) happen to work on Linux, it will not be added. So the missing tray icon and lack of app menu are probably never coming.

It is only available as a Debian package with no RPM version provide. So unless you’re using Debian, Ubuntu or any of their derivatives, you are out of luck. It may also be possible to convert the Debian package to RPM, but then again why all that hassle for an app that is not really under development.

Install Spotify In Ubuntu

Still want to install it on your Ubuntu desktop or derivative, follow the steps below. And we’ll update this article if there is any news about the official client development or there is an alternative to Spotify for Linux.

curl -sS https://download.spotify.com/debian/pubkey_0D811D58.gpg | sudo apt-key add - 
echo "deb http://repository.spotify.com stable non-free" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/spotify.list

2. ​Add the Spotify repository –3. ​Update list of available packages –

sudo apt-get update

4. Install Spotify –

sudo apt-get install spotify-client

Third-Party Clients For Spotify

If the “unofficial” client won’t cut it for you, there are also a few third-party clients out there you can choose from. Let’s take a look at a few of them.

1. Mopidy

Mopidy plays music from local disk, Spotify, SoundCloud, Google Play Music, and more. You edit the playlist from any phone, tablet, or computer using a range of MPD and web clients. To install Mopidy enter the following commands.

Add the archive’s GPG key:

wget -q -O – https://apt.mopidy.com/mopidy.gpg | sudo apt-key add –Add the APT repo to your package sources:

sudo wget -q -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mopidy.list https://apt.mopidy.com/jessie.list​

Install Mopidy and all dependencies:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install mopidy

Finally, you need to set a couple of config values, and then you’re ready to run Mopidy or run Mopidy as a service.

2. Tomahawk (Discontinued)

A new kind of music player that invites all your streams, downloads, cloud music storage, playlists, radio stations and friends to the same party. It’s about time they all mingle. Follow the following to install Tomahawk.

​For Ubuntu 16.04 users: Tomahawk 0.8.4 is in the official ubuntu sources. Or add the following untrusted PPA and then install it

Conclusion

If you want to use Spotify on your Linux desktop, you can use the Linux desktop client, but be aware that there are numerous bugs and that the developers have no plans to fix them. If you really want to use Spotify on Linux, the web client or a third-party client like Mopidy are your best bets. You could also use WINE to emulate the Windows desktop client. Please leave your thoughts in the comments section.