- United Airlines now lets you stream Spotify on its in-flight entertainment system
- Available on some flights now, but rolling out to wider destinations in 2027
- Doesn’t cost you for in-flight Wi-Fi (although you’ll need a Spotify account)
Passport: check. Boarding pass: check. Water bottle you’ll forget to empty until the security gate and will therefore have to drink in one go? Check. But have you remembered to download your Spotify playlists so you can listen while your phone is in airplane mode? Probably not — I always forget until the flight’s boarding too.
Well, Spotify says there’s no such thing as too late, because its new partnership ensures you can listen when you’re at cruising altitude. This collab is with United, a US-based airline which the music streaming giant worked with before.
Rolling out immediately, but only to certain flights, you’ll now be able to access your Spotify account via the plane’s in-flight entertainment system. Initially, this’ll just apply if the plane has a Starlink connection, but apparently in 2027 more of its fleet will support the function.
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This is the second stage of United’s Spotify collab. The first part put limited Spotify account libraries onto the airline’s in-flight entertainment machines, with 450 hours of podcasts and playlists accessible — but if you share my views on what the streaming site tries to push, you’ll agree that it’s much better to be able to choose what you listen to.
Hitting those Wrapped numbers
You won’t need to pay for in-flight Wi-Fi access to be able to use the United Spotify terminals. Otherwise, why wouldn’t you pay for Wi-Fi and use it on your phone? However Spotify’s press release didn’t say if it’s for all users, or just paid-for Premium accounts.
Instead, you need to log into your flight’s United Wi-Fi network, open Spotify on the seat-back screen, and use your phone’s camera to scan a QR code to log in. You’ll quickly have access to all of your Spotify playlists and podcasts to enjoy on your flight. Presumably, you’ll be automatically logged out once your flight ends.
Of course, the caveat here is that in-flight entertainment generally requires a wired headphone connection, but thankfully there are receivers which let you use your wireless headphones on flights and we covered some new ones recently.
Personally, when I’m not reading on a flight, I like to use those seat-back screens to smash through some recent movies I haven’t seen before — watching them on a 240p display that judders in turbulence is probably just what the director intended. But if you prefer to be listening to music non-stop, or have a go-to napping playlist which you’ve forgotten to download, this’ll be a useful addition to your journey.
With Spotify wrapped coming up, if you’ve got an intended result in mind, it’s time to start playing that track on repeat so it’s top of your charts. United’s making that easy: log in, put Mmmbop on repeat, and nap through it for your 12-hour flight.
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