Change Your Tune: How to Transfer Playlists Between Spotify and Apple Music

Transferring saved albums and playlists between Spotify and Apple Music is doable but takes some work. The rival music-streaming services aren’t exactly the best of friends, so there’s no official transfer tool like the one available for Apple Music and YouTube Music. Instead, you’ll need a third-party app or service. There are several that work as advertised, but most aren’t free. Here’s what you need to know.

Transfer Playlists Between Spotify and Apple Music

SongShift is an iOS app that does a fantastic job matching songs from Amazon Music, Apple Music, Tidal, Pandora, YouTube, and Spotify, among others. While some basic functions are accessible for free, the paid subscription removes any size constraints, allowing you to transfer your entire library between more than just two services. It also unlocks batch-transfers, syncs changes to playlists, and much more.

(Credit: PCMag / SongShift)

Install SongShift, and you’ll be greeted with a list of available music services. Sign into any service you use, and select the plus (+) sign. On an iPhone, it will be in the top right-hand corner, while on an iPad and Mac, it will be in the middle pane.

(Credit: PCMag / SongShift)

For Apple Music, select Albums and then Full Library Transfer. For Spotify, select Albums you’ve liked and then Full Library Transfer. This will match your current library of music to whichever new service you want to use.

(Credit: PCMag / SongShift)

You can also select either service and then Playlist to transfer individual playlists. If you only need the app to make a one-time transition, then a $6.99 monthly subscription may work. A yearly subscription is $29.99 while a lifetime purchase is available for $59.99.

(Credit: PCMag / SongShift)

Soundiiz is a similar service available on the web and Android. This tool can transfer, sync, and share your playlists and music data, but it can also generate completely new playlists based on your preferences from connected services. A $4.50/month premium tier ($3 if billed annually) allows for easier playlist transfers, among other things.

Another option is Playlisty, which has free apps for Apple Music and Spotify users. But you can only transfer playlists with up to 20 tracks; a $2.99 in-app purchase unlocks unlimited length playlists. FreeYourMusic, meanwhile, offers apps for PCs, iOS, and Android, with a premium version starting around $4 a month for features like auto-syncing new playlists.

Transfer Playlists to a New Account

If you want to move a playlist from one account to another on the same service, there are no official tools from Spotify or Apple that do this. However, there is a workaround for Spotify and Apple Music if you make a playlist public and then add it to your new account from a shared link. It’s also worth noting that your Apple Music library will be deleted once you cancel the service, but your Spotify playlists are retained since you can revert to a free account.

About Tyler Hayes

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I’ve contributed to PCMag since 2019, covering all kinds of consumer electronics. As a self-identifying early adopter of technology, I’ve stumbled through the changing devices over the years and usually end up writing about how they work, why they’re great, or how they could be better.

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