How to Leave Spotify and Keep Your Music: A Practical Guide to Switching Services

The case for leaving Spotify, as Aftermath's writer lays it out, begins with a week of bad news. The company is about to roll out an AI-powered remix and cover feature, which the author calls ghoulish. It is the latest in a run of controversies: criticism that Spotify doesn't pay artists enough, layoffs of its own workforce, and what the author describes as support for the genocide in Palestine. This is an opinion piece, and those characterizations are the writer's own.

The author's argument on timing is blunt. The best moment to quit was when any of those earlier stories surfaced. The second best is now. What follows is a three-step guide, and the lede promises it is easier than readers probably expect.

Step one is choosing where to go. For people willing to step away from streaming entirely, the author points to buying albums directly on Bandcamp, which puts money in an artist's hands. For those who can't give up a streaming catalogue, the guide names Tidal, Apple Music and Qobuz as workable options. It advises against Amazon and YouTube Music. The objection to Amazon and Google is partly ethical, since the author says both companies are bad, and partly technical: the apps are poor, and YouTube Music in particular is said to have terrible sound quality.

Step two is moving the library. Some services handle this natively. Apple Music on iOS, for example, can sometimes bring a Spotify library straight across. Where that isn't offered, the author suggests third-party tools such as Free Your Music or TuneMyMusic. They may cost a few dollars, which the author considers a worthwhile investment, and in the writer's experience they do a very good job of moving an entire library, playlists included, to the new platform.

Podcasts are the one wrinkle. Most competing music apps carry podcasts as well, so listeners may not need to change anything. Where they don't, the guide offers Pocket Casts as a fully workable replacement. The author notes that Android users, for instance, can't use Apple Podcasts.

Step three comes only after the transfer is done: delete the Spotify account. The author then recommends blocking Spotify's email addresses, because within a few weeks the company will begin sending what the writer calls pathetic offers to win people back. The original piece illustrates this with an example of such an email.

The guide is a practical one, but it rests on one writer's judgment, and the AI feature is described only as upcoming. Readers weighing a switch will want to watch how that remix and cover tool actually launches, and what Spotify says about it, before deciding how much weight to give the objection.