Spotify Officially Launches Apple Watch App With Limited Capabilities

Spotify has officially launched an Apple Watch version of its app, just a couple weeks after a beta version surfaced earlier this month.

The music streaming giant announced the arrival of its long-awaited watchOS app in a press release on Tuesday — which it says will give users the ability to “seamlessly access and control your favorite music and podcasts” from the Apple wearable.

Limited Capability

At launch, the capability of the app will be fairly limited, however. The first version of the watchOS app will allow users to control music — with play, pause, skip and rewind options — playing on their connected iPhone or a supported Spotify Connect device.

In addition, there are new Spotify complications included for users to add to their watch faces. The Spotify music controls will also replace the standard Now Playing menu on Apple Watches.

On the other hand, offline music playback is not included in the initial Apple Watch app. Music also can’t be streamed directly to an Apple Watch through LTE or an iPhone connection.

In other words, the app will let an Apple Watch function more as a remote for its iOS counterpart rather than a full-fledged streaming app itself.

The announcement comes about a week or so after Spotify public software testers noted that a pared-down version of the app appeared in a recent beta version. Users reported limited functionality in that beta, and it doesn’t appear that any new features have been added since.

It’s also been about a year since a third-party developer had created an app called Snowy that does allow offline playback. Reportedly, Spotify tapped the developer to work with it to create a watchOS companion app sometime last year.

Initial Slow Rollout

Of course, this is only the initial rollout — so fans should be patient but not disappointed. Spotify promises that offline playback for music and podcasts are coming in a future version of the Apple Watch app, among other “exciting” features that it has yet to announce.

Spotify says that users will need the latest version of its iOS app (v8.4.79) to use the new watchOS companion app. The Apple Watch app should begin rolling out to users over the next week.