Spotify now works with all [Android] Google Assistant-enabled devices

Just yesterday (in the morning), I was digging through the settings of Google Assistant on my phone (I am weird like that). For some strange reason, I clicked on the music under the “Services” section. There was Google Play Music at the top and Spotify at the bottom. Spotify showed up as “unlinked” while the former required a subscription, something that is not possible since I live in Kenya. Sigh. Seeing as it that I use (and prefer) Spotify and Assistant was able to establish that the app is installed on my phone, I quickly selected it so that it could be linked to Google Assistant on my phone.

While doing all that, little did I know that it was a feature that would, in a few hours, be rolling out to every single Android user whose device has the Google Assistant either enabled or accessible.

A statement by Spotify reads:

“Today, we’re excited to announce that the convenience of controlling Spotify through Google Assistant is coming to millions of Android users globally. Both Free and Premium users are now able to use their voice to control Spotify across Google Assistant-supported devices.”

I have previously been able to play songs from Spotify by asking Assistant to do so but that always involved an extra step where Assistant asks where to play a specific song or album from. When linked with a Spotify account (it can be premium or free, it doesn’t matter), Assistant will now just play any song you ask of it straight from Spotify. Unless you tell her (I am biased, there’s a male voice now – which you can’t enable if you’re in Kenya) to do so.

I only have some minor gripes with how the whole thing works. Asking it to play an album by Sidewalk Prophets took me to the Spotify page of the artist and that was it. It did not start playback. That’s annoying.

You can go about linking up your Spotify account with Google Assistant by following these easy steps:

– Launch Google Assistant

– Click the menu at the top

– Click the three dots at the top to reveal another menu

– Click Settings

– Scroll down to the Services section and click Music

– Link Spotify and live happily ever after

I know, Spotify is quite elusive if you live in Kenya and you can’t get it off the Google Play Store. However, there’s always a workaround. In this case, get the app from APKMirror or APKPure then pick any one of these VPN apps and disguise your location. Once done, you can go about following the above steps.

Don’t have Google Assistant, yet? This might be of help (just be sure to get more recent versions of the application package installer/APK).

If you don’t have Spotify listed as one of the options in your Google Assistant’s service settings preferences, then you may have to wait. Spotify says that the “full support for Spotify on Google Assistant will be rolled out in the coming weeks”.