Spotify already uses AI to help pick what plays next. But its planned remix tool, reportedly set for release early next year, would let listeners change what they’re hearing. How does it work? Let’s say a slow breakup ballad comes on at a party. A subscriber could turn it into a dance track that better fits the vibe. Want a new artist’s voice? The tool could also make a different singer cover the song, even if they’ve never recorded it before.
Spotify first announced the tool in May, but it got people talking again on Oct. 30, when the Financial Times reported that the company was targeting an early 2027 launch and considering charging Premium subscribers an extra $4 to $5 a month.
What subscribers would get for that extra fee depends on which musicians sign up in the first place. At this point, Spotify has deals with Universal Music Group, Merlin, Believe, and Kobalt, but the FT reported that artists would decide individually whether to participate, even if their label had signed a deal. Believe and TuneCore artists would first have to agree to be considered for AI projects, then decide separately whether to join Spotify’s program.
Some listeners are already talking about leaving
The plan raises different questions for fans and musicians. For people who’ve been paying for Spotify for years, the discussion quickly moved past whether they’d buy the add-on to whether they wanted to keep their subscription at all. “If @Spotify ends up going through with this, then I’ll be cancelling my subscription,” wrote one X user, who said they’d subscribed since 2017. Another user wrote, “I want to hear that you’ve finally wrapped it up and quit spotify.”
Mashable Trend Report
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Others were already thinking about what it would take to switch. “Please does anyone know good ways to transfer all my Spotify songs to another site?” one user asked her followers. Over on the subreddit r/indieheads, people were comparing Tidal and Qobuz and discussing buying music directly on Bandcamp. One vinyl buyer explained why leaving would still be hard. “Having podcasts and the ability to just look up new bands instantly is something I’d really struggle to part with,” they wrote.
That convenience is part of what Spotify has been using AI to build on. As Mashable has reported, its AI DJ can take spoken requests, and its Prompted Playlist feature lets listeners describe what they want to hear in their own words. AI is showing up in the songs themselves, too. The Velvet Sundown, an AI-generated band, drew more than a million Spotify streams in 2025, and AI-powered singer Xania Monet made it onto Billboard’s Adult R&B Airplay chart that same year. There’s, of course, some irony in Spotify asking listeners to pay to make AI covers while it’s also trying to limit AI spam and help people tell when an artist persona is AI-generated.
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What would musicians get out of it?
For artists weighing whether to opt in, there’s the question of what Spotify would do with their music and what they’d earn from it. The Future of Music Coalition put it plainly on X. “What’s it being trained on? Is it opt-in only? How’s the $ work?” the group wrote.
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Spotify and Believe, the French music distributor that owns TuneCore, have answered part of the money question. In an October announcement about their licensing deal, the companies said each remix would link back to the original song and artist. “Streams of these remixes will generate royalties for the participating artists and rights holders behind the original works,” they said. The FT also reported that those plays would count toward the original song on Spotify’s charts. So a fan-made version could earn royalties while giving listeners a way to find the track that inspired it.
Even if Spotify can make the royalties work, there’s still the question of whether anyone really wants more AI-generated music in the first place. As one X user put it, “Why would anyone want this?”
Topics
Artificial Intelligence
Spotify
