How to Listen to Spotify Music on Linux with Ease

There's over 70 million tracks and more than 2.6 million podcast titles on Spotify. With this great music streaming platform, you are able to easily and quickly find those tracks you love. Currently, Spotify is compatible with various devices, including Windows, Mac, Android and iOS devices, as well as some smart devices.

So, does Spotify work on Linux? In fact, Spotify doesn't offer its service to those people who use the computer running Linux. But fortunately, those engineers from Spotify develop several different ways of installing Spotify for Linux. Since that, you are allowed to enjoy the largest streaming service and catalog in the Linux ecosystem.

If you are not familiar with the process to install and play Spotify on Linux, the post will show you how to do it with two easiest solutions, including installing Spotify on Ubuntu and using Spotify web player on Linux. Also, we are going to share an alternative method to play Spotify music on Linux without the official client.

How to Install Spotify on Linux for Playing Music

Here you can find different ways of installing Spotify for Linux. The experience may differ from our other Spotify Desktop clients, such as Windows and Mac. Follow the below steps to install Spotify on Linux, then listen to Spotify on your Linux machines.

Option 1: Install Spotify for Ubuntu via Snap

With the launch of Spotify Snap, a universal app package that works across Linux flavors, it's getting much easier for Spotify users to install the Spotify app on the Linux machine. If you don't have access or don't want to use Ubuntu Software, it is possible to install Spotify from the command line with snap.

The following is the complete guide to install Spotify for Ubuntu using snap. Users of Ubuntu 16.04, 17.10 and 18.04 can install Spotify directly from the Ubuntu Software Center where the snap package is available. If your system doesn't have snap, you can install it using command line as below:

Then install Spotify Snap app with this command:

Once installed, you can find the Spotify app in the application menu. Upon starting, it will ask you to log in for the first time. If you run another Linux distribution than Ubuntu, first see https://snapcraft.io/ for how to install snap, then run the command above.

Option 2: Install Spotify in Ubuntu via Deb Package

Spotify for Linux is also released as a Debian package with which you can install Spotify client in Linux by following the guide below:

To install the desktop client of Spotify, open a terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and use the following commands:

This will add the above repository in software sources list. Now add the GPG key:

After the software repo key has been added, your PC will recognize the Spotify server as a secure repository. The next step is to update and install Spotify client.

Now simply start Spotify by searching for its Unity Dash (in Ubuntu). It integrates very well in Ubuntu environment.

How to Use Spotify Web Player on Linux for Listening

Except for Spotify Desktop client, you can also use Spotify web player to stream your favorite music on your Linux machine. It's easy to open Spotify web player to play music from a web browser.

You just need to download the latest release of Spotify Web Player for Linux. The Spotify Web Player for Linux is released from the GitHub project page. You could navigate to the website and install Spotify Web Player for Linux. Then follow the instructions to start playing music on Linux via Spotify Web Player for Linux.

Best Method to Listen to Spotify on Linux without Spotify

According to Spotify, Spotify for Linux is a labor of love from their engineers that wanted to listen to Spotify on their Linux development machines. The use of Spotify Desktop client differs from those on Windows and Mac. In other words, the maintenance of Spotify for Linux might not be as frequent as other operating systems.

So, if you are looking for an alternative way to play Spotify songs on Linux, you can follow this method which will download Spotify songs onto Windows or Mac as MP3 so that you can then transfer those offline songs to play on Linux even without the official client. You could use other media players like Clementine media player to play Spotify on Linux.

3.1 Download Music from Spotify to MP3

The program is called ViWizard Spotify Music Converter, a smart music downloader for Spotify. With this program, you can download and save any Spotify track into MP3, WAV, AAC, and other common formats. Once downloaded, you can sync Spotify songs to your Linux machine for playback.

Key Features of ViWizard Spotify Music Downloader

• Download Spotify songs, albums, playlists, podcasts, audiobooks offline
• Export Spotify music to computer in MP3, WAV, FLAC, AAC, M4A, M4B, AAC.
• Keep the lossless audio quality and ID3 tags like title, artist, and more
• Convert Spotify songs at 5× faster speed and with an easy-to-use UI

3,000,000+ Downloads

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You can simply download and install the free trial version of ViWizard Spotify Music Converter on Windows and Mac machines. Then follow the instructions below to easily download Spotify songs for Linux.

Step 1Add Spotify music to ViWizard

Launch ViWizard Spotify Music Converter and it will load Spotify Desktop client automatically. Then log into your Spotify account and find songs you want to listen to on your Linux machine. Now drag any playlist or track from Spotify to the interface of ViWizard.

Step 2Set the output audio parameters

After adding Spotify songs to the converter, click the top menu > Preferences. Then you can select the output format as you like, including MP3, AAC, WAV, FLAC, M4A, and M4B. You can also change other parameters like audio channel, bit rate, and sample rate.

Step 3Start downloading Spotify music

Click the Convert button to start downloading and converting Spotify music to plain format with ID3 tags kept. Once converted, click the Converted icon to find the downloaded tracks. Then you can easily share those offline songs to Linux for playing anytime.

3.2 Play Spotify music on Linux via Clementine

Clementine is a very popular multiplatform music player on Linux. It focuses on a fast and easy-to-use interface for searching and playing your music. As it supports various music files, you are able to add your converted Spotify music tracks to Clementine. Then you can manage and play Spotify music on Clementine.

1) Install Clementine on your Linux machine and then launch it.
2) Click on the Tools under the menu bar and choose Preferences to open a new window.
3) Click on the Music Library button and choose the Add new folder to scan all music folder.
4) Go to the folder where you save the converted Spotify music files and then add them to Clementine.
5) After that, start to play Spotify music on the Linux machine by using Clementine.

Wrap Up

To install Spotify for Linux, you need to use Snap or Deb Package. Then you can get the Spotify app for Linux. But you could also choose to use Spotify Web Player on Linux. For a better listening experience, we do recommend ViWizard Spotify Music Converter. With its help, you can easily download Spotify songs to Linux for playing through any media player on the Linux machine.

Matt Smith is an amateur writer engaged in ViWizard in 2013. He is a movie lover who write a lot of movie reviews for many websites and blogs.