What if you could tell Spotify that what you listened to yesterday does not necessarily describe what you want to hear tomorrow? On September 23, 2026, the platform announced that it was expanding Taste Profile, in beta, to Premium subscribers aged 18 and over in the United States. Previously tested in New Zealand, the feature shows users a summary of how Spotify interprets their taste. They can then write notes to steer recommendations on their Home feed. It is a small interface change, but a deeper shift in the relationship between listeners and the algorithm.
Seeing what the platform thinks it knows
A streaming service learns from plays, searches and recurring habits. The result can feel convenient, then narrow: a playlist used for one party, a podcast followed for a few weeks or an audiobook tried out of curiosity can influence the picture the platform forms of a person. Taste Profile makes part of that picture visible. According to Spotify, it brings together a brief interpretation of preferences across music, podcasts and audiobooks, then lets the listener correct its direction with notes.
This visibility is not a complete window into how the system works. Spotify describes a short account of its conclusions, not access to the data, weightings or code that rank every track. The change is still meaningful: rather than merely skipping a song or manually searching for something else, a user can offer general direction to their Home feed.
A sentence to shift discovery
The company’s examples range widely: asking for more 1990s alternative rock, exploring contemporary indie music, looking for tracks that suit a particular moment, or seeing more history podcasts and art audiobooks. Listeners can also indicate what they no longer want. Spotify says the notes provide gentle guidance to the Home feed. They are not absolute commands guaranteeing that a particular genre or creator will appear every time the app opens.
The distinction from building a playlist by hand matters. A playlist selects tracks; Taste Profile tries to influence the discovery environment itself. If it works as intended, listeners might escape a recommendation loop that sticks too closely to their past without starting from scratch. Emerging artists could also find new opportunities to reach people who explicitly express interest in a style or era. That potential effect is an inference, not a result established by the announcement.
Who can use it, and how?
For now, Spotify limits the beta to Premium subscribers aged at least 18 in the US and New Zealand. In the mobile app, eligible users can tap their profile picture, choose Taste Profile, read the interpretation shown and enter a note under “Tell us more.” Spotify says changes generally appear within hours and notes can be edited or deleted. Leaving the profile alone is also an option: the feature does not require listeners to manage every aspect of their discovery themselves.
The geographical restriction matters to an international audience. The September 23 announcement does not promise immediate access in France, Belgium, Canada or African countries. Nor does it provide a global timetable. Describing Taste Profile as available everywhere would confuse a US rollout with a worldwide launch. The New Zealand test was announced in March; the US phase expands the experiment without making it universal.
Another control, but not the first
Spotify already allowed users to exclude certain tracks or playlists from their taste profile. On September 15, the company also announced a toggle for removing kids’ and family music from the listening signals that shape recommendations. That tool addresses a familiar problem: sharing a device or family listening time does not mean songs played for a child should determine suggestions aimed at an adult. Taste Profile goes further by allowing a positive intention, expressed in everyday language, rather than exclusion alone.
These tools raise a basic question: who gets to define personal taste? Listening histories record behaviour, not necessarily durable preferences. People sometimes play something to work, learn, accompany someone else or simply try it. By letting users add context, Spotify implicitly recognises the limits of an identity calculated only from clicks. Yet that context still passes through the categories and intentions the platform is able to interpret.
Personalisation becomes a negotiation
From a business perspective, better recommendations can help a service retain subscribers and increase the time they spend in its app. More control may therefore serve both listeners and Spotify. The balance will be judged in practice: do notes usefully change the Home feed, broaden discovery and remain easy to manage? The company does not provide independent evidence of those outcomes in this announcement.
The novelty is not that Spotify personalises music: it has done so for years. It is that the platform now asks some subscribers to participate more explicitly in that process. For now, Taste Profile is a beta reserved for Premium adults in two markets. Its promise is to make recommendations a little less mysterious and a little more open to discussion. Its real success will depend on what listeners see after telling the app, in their own words, what they want to discover.
Sources
- Spotify, September 23, 2026 Taste Profile announcement: operation, markets and eligibility.
- Spotify, March 2026 New Zealand beta announcement: origin of the test.
- Spotify, September 15, 2026 announcement: controls for kids’ and family music in the taste profile.