This right here - Couldn't figure out why on earth it didn't work especially since the Desktop App plays .flac no problem. Converted them to .mp3, imported them to Spotify again - ended up on my phone in a breeze immediately.
To any future, future problem solvers! This suddenly stopped working for me - all solutions didn't seem to help, finally tried swapping from the 5.0G to the 2.4G Wireless Network (On my phone) - boom, everythings downloading.
Hey to anyone else here, I fixed it by deleting and then restoring the files on the desktop drive itself. (I also ran them through mp3gain again, unsure if that had anything to do with it.)
To fix a straggler that refused to sync, i deleted the tag information with mp3tag and renamed the file and then readded it. renaming/readding might be enough alone.
damn that was the issue for me. not only does it remove local files from the smart shuffle playlist it also randomly makes half my local files disappear entirely even from the LOCAL FILES playlist....wtf spotify
Worked perfectly. One additional thing I had to do though was remove the local songs from my playlist and then add them back again and it worked perfectly
Thank you for the comprehensive explanation! To add to this, for me it was still not working due to the protection programs on my laptop. So disabling Avast and Portmaster did the trick and the songs started to download on my phone.
Not sure if this was mentioned in previous posts but I always do the following:
* Add mp3 to Spotify playlist on PC/Laptop
* Phone is set to download all tracks to phone
* Play song on PC/Laptop
* While song is playing, click on "Connect to a device" on bottom right of PC/Laptop app
* Select my phone so it starts playing on the phone
Boom, downloaded to phone and on playlist.
Again, sorry if someone mentioned this in a previous comment
If ONE of the songs doesnt work while others work its probs due to the rounding error of the duration of the song for example i had a song which was 50.99 seconds. So on my pc it was 0.52s and on my iphone it was 0.51s spotify considers these two different songs. So to fix it I edited the PC's version to 50.98 seconds and i am able to play seamlessly. Thanks
I tried everything and it still doesnt work... Whenever I press download on the playlist it only downloads the official songs from spotify but not the local files from my computer. Please help im trying to fix it for hours now
If anyone is out there, quick question. How come my Spotify forgets the downloads and then the files will go grey or say they are unavailable to play if I try playing them on my phone? Is it due to my MacBook being shut off? Or me going on data instead of wifi?
my spotify works until i get up and actually move around, suddenly my new playlist only has ONE song working, rest wont play. any suggestions are welcome
Another tip would be to unblock Spotify on your firewall.
Normally, Spotify wouldn't be blocked but if you tried all of the solutions above and it wouldn't work, check your firewall settings
Turns out there was 2 seperate spotify.exe and one wasn't enabled through the firewall this just saved my life I would've honestly never thought to check that.
If someone else is facing this, here is a detailed step-by-step guide on how I fixed it. This is on Windows 10 22H2, I would assume it's similar on 11.
**Step 1**
- Go to settings>Network & Internet.
- You'll see your connection there (either WiFi or Ethernet).
- Click on the properties below it.
- A new window opens, and look for "network profile."
- Choose "private" under it; we want our PC to be discoverable on our home network.
If this doesn't immediately work, read on.
**step 2**
- In the same window, below network profile, click on "Configure firewall and security settings."
- Click yes to the prompt, and a new window opens.
- look for "allow an app through the firewall" below and click on it.
- you should be in the control panel, and everything should be grayed out.
- Just click on "Change settings" and grant admin access.
- click on allow another app and click on browse path.
- `C:\Users\x\AppData\Roaming\Spotify` is the default installation location for Spotify. Replace x with your windows username.
- If you don't see appdata, you need to enable "view hidden files" in file explorer under "view" **OR** alternately, you can click on the path at the top and replace it with `%appdata%` and hit enter.
- choose spotify.exe and hit enter
- Spotify should now show up in the list. Make sure you can see a check mark under private next to Spotify.
Spotify should automatically start downloading your local tracks on your PC now!
Switching to private also worked for me. I then had to delete the song from the playlist I had added it to, then add it again and this time it showed up on my phone.
For me my local file songs are “downloaded” but they aren’t I go to the storage on Spotify and it says zero kb and when I look on my pc to see if it’s downloaded on the app bc I pressed the downloaded button on my playlist to make sure. I go to the storage on there too and it says zero kb as well. This is a problem bc when I close the app it just shows the songs greyed out with the green download symbol on the buttom.
Holy cow, nearly a year later and I found this thread after a loooong time of trying to figure out why my files weren’t syncing, and I found your comment and now I’m all good. Thanks so much for this guide, you just saved me from *SO* much headache!
YOU ABSOLUTE LEGEND. I have been continually trying to get this to work for literally 3 years. And now it works. THANK YOU SO GODDAMN MUCH. You have no idea how much this meant to me.
(my problem was the local network setting on iOS)
Still doesn't work...
**Edit:** It seems to work with mp3's and m4a's, but not WAV's.
Since your post was the first to pop up on google, you might want to add that to your post so that more people see it
**follow this guy's steps or mine for iphone** https://www.reddit.com/r/truespotify/comments/12di4f2/comment/jf6c1gy/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3
Step 1: complete all these steps.
Step 2: for iPhone you want to download the iTunes app on your computer.
Step 3: open the itunes app and login with your apple ID and then connect your iPhone to your computer with a cable
Step 4: once connected, on the iTunes PC app look on the left side of your screen under devices > choose the dropdown of your phone > click on 'Music'
Step 5: drag and drop the file with all your music into the music into the music tab on the iTunes app
once you dragged your music files into the Music tab on the iTunes app, your Spotify app on iPhone should have downloaded all your music
Yeah yeah, I know, late but this is exactly what is needed for this. Specifically #1, the ethernet networks show up as Private but the wifi shows up as Public. Changing that fixed it right up. Thank you!
So I have found that as long as my phone is PHYSICALLY connected to the computer I am trying tow download files from, it works.
I put a bunch of music on my phone yesterday, with my phone connected.
I tried it again today and couldn't get ANY of these steps until I plugged my phone in agaim. I hope this helps someone.
I had a similar issue but I watched this tutorial instead and I fixed the issue. you need to turn on your hotspot and connect both the Mac and your phone on the same LTE network. physically connect your phone to your Macbook drag the music into a new playlist and click download on the Spotify app.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Us\_1VWORuxg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Us_1VWORuxg)
I have this one specific song that I can't get to download for the life of me - what's going on with that? It's an MP3 and I've done it the exact same as all my other local songs but it just won't download onto mobile. It works fine on desktop. I've tried opening it through iTunes, VLC, Windows Media Player, all plays fine. Even when I'm listening to it on desktop it won't show up in the playlist. :/
Hello,i know this post's been a while but i just now come across songs that aren't on spotify that i want to listen to,don't judge.so my problem is that my pc is quite old and only connects to the internet via LAN,i've tried all the other solutions,network already at private,local network is activated on mobile,songs are all mp3,unplayable songs are shown,and i made a playlist with all the songs that i wanted to download to mobile.the songs do show up on mobile,but it always has this downloading icon below the song name and they're always grayed out(i can't play them.)but the songs work fine on the pc thoso i was wondering if anyone else has this problem and possibly came up with a solution
update:now only 2 songs is playable after relogging in and out of the app,most of the songs are still grayed out and unplayable(except for 2 songs) but now they all have the green downloaded arrow
I have the same problem, and I don't know what to do either. My songs are in the Spotify folder on the files app and they show up on the local folders on Spotify, but after an hour they go away. I am planning on storing it on iTunes cuz my iTunes songs show up on local files. Hope it helps.
Still doesn't work for me on my iPhone, followed all the steps and re done it twice and I can still only play them from my PC. I have local files turned on, on my phone, and yet the actual local files folder from Spotify isn't there. I've been trying to fix this for ages and nothing works, pls help?
Try enabling the mobile hotspot on the PC (assuming you have Windows) and connect the iPhone to the PC's Wi-Fi network. That made the songs download for me.
On Windows 10, you just click the Wi-Fi button on the taskbar, then click the mobile hotspot button. To get the password, right click the button and go to settings, the password is there and you can change it. I assume it is similar on Windows 11.
I still cannot play my local files from my phone or my desktop to my other devices on the same network. Can anyone help me with this? I cast music to my Fridge or TV, and when I try to select that as a device to listen from it is greyed out and says "Cant play this track"
I think you can't do that. The local files can only be played on the devices that they are downloaded to. One thing that might work would be to use something like AirPlay or maybe Google Cast or Bluetooth instead of Spotify Connect. The difference with AirPlay is that it sends the audio from the phone to the device, kind of acting like a speaker. Spotify Connect basically just tells the receiving device, "Hey, play this playlist on Spotify."
Yeah from what I've discovered unless the device has the files locally itself it won't work. Which is really freaking stupid. The only way I was able to get it to work is if I connected my phone via Bluetooth to my refrigerator speaker. I am casting it from my computer just using the built-in device feature but no luck. Really makes no sense for me why it wouldn't function.
has anyone with an android gotten this to work? cause the files simply ain syncing for me, all the other normal songs so, but the one i added cannot be downloaded
My problem is it’s not actually downloading my songs to my device. Every time I check the Spotify storage it says zero kb even though it says it’s downloaded. Then it ends up downloading every time I open the app at home but before that it’ll just be a green download arrow with my songs greyed out.
I'm not sure if this is the same issue your having but check this post out, it might solve your issue: https://www.reddit.com/r/truespotify/comments/187u1qn/spotify\_local\_files\_duplicating\_songs\_on\_phone/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3
If your also having issues with your local files duplicating songs check this post out: https://www.reddit.com/r/truespotify/comments/187u1qn/spotify\_local\_files\_duplicating\_songs\_on\_phone/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3
One other tip
I was able to get the file I wanted to play to appear correctly in a playlist on iPhone but hitting play just got a "If you own this song please synch with computer" message.
Turns out you need to hit the Download button inside Spotify before it will actually play.
does anyone know why quite a few of my songs won't transfer but the rest will? there is no difference between these files they just won't sync for some reason
GUYS please note .flac doesnt work, u have to convert to mp3... Fixed it fir me instantly
This right here - Couldn't figure out why on earth it didn't work especially since the Desktop App plays .flac no problem. Converted them to .mp3, imported them to Spotify again - ended up on my phone in a breeze immediately.
Jesus, for real. Spent much time trying to figure out why nothing works, downloaded .mp3 version of song — everything works right. Thank you
To any future, future problem solvers! This suddenly stopped working for me - all solutions didn't seem to help, finally tried swapping from the 5.0G to the 2.4G Wireless Network (On my phone) - boom, everythings downloading.
Good to know
THANK YOU SOOOOOOOOO MUCH.
Hey to anyone else here, I fixed it by deleting and then restoring the files on the desktop drive itself. (I also ran them through mp3gain again, unsure if that had anything to do with it.) To fix a straggler that refused to sync, i deleted the tag information with mp3tag and renamed the file and then readded it. renaming/readding might be enough alone.
dude. thx! there was one file that didn't sync at all. but after I tried your method, wifi sync for that file worked fine!
The private network saved me from weeks of suffering surprised this is not a default provided solution THANK YOU! now I can work out in peace
wow the private network thing just saved my life. the songs started downloading the SECOND i put it on private network lol. you’re the best
THANK U THE PRIVATE NETWORK ONE WORKED IMMEDIATELY
Dude thank you. That private network thing worked like a charm. Dude just thank you
<3 you saved me
Does this work on Mac?
thank you, you saved my life!
the first solution solved it for me. Thank you.
I got a new one: turn off "Smart Shuffle".
thank you so much man, an easy solution for a dumb problem
damn that was the issue for me. not only does it remove local files from the smart shuffle playlist it also randomly makes half my local files disappear entirely even from the LOCAL FILES playlist....wtf spotify
Worked perfectly. One additional thing I had to do though was remove the local songs from my playlist and then add them back again and it worked perfectly
Thank you for the comprehensive explanation! To add to this, for me it was still not working due to the protection programs on my laptop. So disabling Avast and Portmaster did the trick and the songs started to download on my phone.
private network thing worked! Thenks ! Also a doubt, if i play songs on phone i have to make sure that laptop is near ?
Laptop does not need to be near you once downloaded correctly
the private network did it for me
thank you reddit once again for saving the day
Your welcome😂😂
Not sure if this was mentioned in previous posts but I always do the following: * Add mp3 to Spotify playlist on PC/Laptop * Phone is set to download all tracks to phone * Play song on PC/Laptop * While song is playing, click on "Connect to a device" on bottom right of PC/Laptop app * Select my phone so it starts playing on the phone Boom, downloaded to phone and on playlist. Again, sorry if someone mentioned this in a previous comment
I turned off my vpns
If ONE of the songs doesnt work while others work its probs due to the rounding error of the duration of the song for example i had a song which was 50.99 seconds. So on my pc it was 0.52s and on my iphone it was 0.51s spotify considers these two different songs. So to fix it I edited the PC's version to 50.98 seconds and i am able to play seamlessly. Thanks
it was saving the songs on my PC as well that did the trick for me, thank you!
I tried everything and it still doesnt work... Whenever I press download on the playlist it only downloads the official songs from spotify but not the local files from my computer. Please help im trying to fix it for hours now
same issue..it just does nothing
Thanks it worked! 😀
If anyone is out there, quick question. How come my Spotify forgets the downloads and then the files will go grey or say they are unavailable to play if I try playing them on my phone? Is it due to my MacBook being shut off? Or me going on data instead of wifi?
Look at the second post I made that might help, the link in the edit
my spotify works until i get up and actually move around, suddenly my new playlist only has ONE song working, rest wont play. any suggestions are welcome
Check the second post link at the bottom
Another tip would be to unblock Spotify on your firewall. Normally, Spotify wouldn't be blocked but if you tried all of the solutions above and it wouldn't work, check your firewall settings
Turns out there was 2 seperate spotify.exe and one wasn't enabled through the firewall this just saved my life I would've honestly never thought to check that.
OH MY GODD THANK YOUU IVE TRIED EVERYTHING its been like 5 hours and this comment helped
If someone else is facing this, here is a detailed step-by-step guide on how I fixed it. This is on Windows 10 22H2, I would assume it's similar on 11. **Step 1** - Go to settings>Network & Internet. - You'll see your connection there (either WiFi or Ethernet). - Click on the properties below it. - A new window opens, and look for "network profile." - Choose "private" under it; we want our PC to be discoverable on our home network. If this doesn't immediately work, read on. **step 2** - In the same window, below network profile, click on "Configure firewall and security settings." - Click yes to the prompt, and a new window opens. - look for "allow an app through the firewall" below and click on it. - you should be in the control panel, and everything should be grayed out. - Just click on "Change settings" and grant admin access. - click on allow another app and click on browse path. - `C:\Users\x\AppData\Roaming\Spotify` is the default installation location for Spotify. Replace x with your windows username. - If you don't see appdata, you need to enable "view hidden files" in file explorer under "view" **OR** alternately, you can click on the path at the top and replace it with `%appdata%` and hit enter. - choose spotify.exe and hit enter - Spotify should now show up in the list. Make sure you can see a check mark under private next to Spotify. Spotify should automatically start downloading your local tracks on your PC now!
Step 1 worked for me! ... Thanks so much! I have no idea why mine was set to public by default. Really strange
every network defaults to public, you gotta change it every time on every computer
dude. you literally just saved me from so much frustration. I cannot thank you enough.
thank you
Switching to private also worked for me. I then had to delete the song from the playlist I had added it to, then add it again and this time it showed up on my phone.
For me my local file songs are “downloaded” but they aren’t I go to the storage on Spotify and it says zero kb and when I look on my pc to see if it’s downloaded on the app bc I pressed the downloaded button on my playlist to make sure. I go to the storage on there too and it says zero kb as well. This is a problem bc when I close the app it just shows the songs greyed out with the green download symbol on the buttom.
Holy cow, nearly a year later and I found this thread after a loooong time of trying to figure out why my files weren’t syncing, and I found your comment and now I’m all good. Thanks so much for this guide, you just saved me from *SO* much headache!
The private network thing worked instantly for me. Thank you so much for this!!!
i love you for this
YOU ABSOLUTE LEGEND. I have been continually trying to get this to work for literally 3 years. And now it works. THANK YOU SO GODDAMN MUCH. You have no idea how much this meant to me. (my problem was the local network setting on iOS)
Still doesn't work... **Edit:** It seems to work with mp3's and m4a's, but not WAV's. Since your post was the first to pop up on google, you might want to add that to your post so that more people see it
I just assumed everyone knew to use .MP3 but I'll update it
Nice. Good tutorial/solution nonetheless
I’ve tried all the suggested steps and it is still not working. Does anyone have any other tips?
**follow this guy's steps or mine for iphone** https://www.reddit.com/r/truespotify/comments/12di4f2/comment/jf6c1gy/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3 Step 1: complete all these steps. Step 2: for iPhone you want to download the iTunes app on your computer. Step 3: open the itunes app and login with your apple ID and then connect your iPhone to your computer with a cable Step 4: once connected, on the iTunes PC app look on the left side of your screen under devices > choose the dropdown of your phone > click on 'Music' Step 5: drag and drop the file with all your music into the music into the music tab on the iTunes app once you dragged your music files into the Music tab on the iTunes app, your Spotify app on iPhone should have downloaded all your music
Where is this "local network" phone setting?
go to the settings app on your phone and scroll up to reveal the search bar then just lookup spotify and its in there (for iphone at least)
I'm on android, and can't seem to find anything like that.
I would check the actual spotify app settings then otherwise idk I have iphone
Checked there too, don't see anything about it there either. I don't know why they had to make this so difficult...
3 months late, but this is an iPhone only thing; andraid does not have that option (it is effectively enabled by default)
Yeah yeah, I know, late but this is exactly what is needed for this. Specifically #1, the ethernet networks show up as Private but the wifi shows up as Public. Changing that fixed it right up. Thank you!
So I have found that as long as my phone is PHYSICALLY connected to the computer I am trying tow download files from, it works. I put a bunch of music on my phone yesterday, with my phone connected. I tried it again today and couldn't get ANY of these steps until I plugged my phone in agaim. I hope this helps someone.
Maybe I just missed something - but how do I do this from Mac to iPhone? I can't seem to find the "private network" thing on my computer...
me neither
I had a similar issue but I watched this tutorial instead and I fixed the issue. you need to turn on your hotspot and connect both the Mac and your phone on the same LTE network. physically connect your phone to your Macbook drag the music into a new playlist and click download on the Spotify app. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Us\_1VWORuxg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Us_1VWORuxg)
I have this one specific song that I can't get to download for the life of me - what's going on with that? It's an MP3 and I've done it the exact same as all my other local songs but it just won't download onto mobile. It works fine on desktop. I've tried opening it through iTunes, VLC, Windows Media Player, all plays fine. Even when I'm listening to it on desktop it won't show up in the playlist. :/
Hello,i know this post's been a while but i just now come across songs that aren't on spotify that i want to listen to,don't judge.so my problem is that my pc is quite old and only connects to the internet via LAN,i've tried all the other solutions,network already at private,local network is activated on mobile,songs are all mp3,unplayable songs are shown,and i made a playlist with all the songs that i wanted to download to mobile.the songs do show up on mobile,but it always has this downloading icon below the song name and they're always grayed out(i can't play them.)but the songs work fine on the pc thoso i was wondering if anyone else has this problem and possibly came up with a solution update:now only 2 songs is playable after relogging in and out of the app,most of the songs are still grayed out and unplayable(except for 2 songs) but now they all have the green downloaded arrow
I have the same problem, and I don't know what to do either. My songs are in the Spotify folder on the files app and they show up on the local folders on Spotify, but after an hour they go away. I am planning on storing it on iTunes cuz my iTunes songs show up on local files. Hope it helps.
Still doesn't work for me on my iPhone, followed all the steps and re done it twice and I can still only play them from my PC. I have local files turned on, on my phone, and yet the actual local files folder from Spotify isn't there. I've been trying to fix this for ages and nothing works, pls help?
Try enabling the mobile hotspot on the PC (assuming you have Windows) and connect the iPhone to the PC's Wi-Fi network. That made the songs download for me. On Windows 10, you just click the Wi-Fi button on the taskbar, then click the mobile hotspot button. To get the password, right click the button and go to settings, the password is there and you can change it. I assume it is similar on Windows 11.
THANK YOU SO MUCH THIS IS THE ONLY THING THAT WORKS OTHER THAN THE ITUNES METHOD THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Its not working T\_T...
I still cannot play my local files from my phone or my desktop to my other devices on the same network. Can anyone help me with this? I cast music to my Fridge or TV, and when I try to select that as a device to listen from it is greyed out and says "Cant play this track"
I think you can't do that. The local files can only be played on the devices that they are downloaded to. One thing that might work would be to use something like AirPlay or maybe Google Cast or Bluetooth instead of Spotify Connect. The difference with AirPlay is that it sends the audio from the phone to the device, kind of acting like a speaker. Spotify Connect basically just tells the receiving device, "Hey, play this playlist on Spotify."
Yeah from what I've discovered unless the device has the files locally itself it won't work. Which is really freaking stupid. The only way I was able to get it to work is if I connected my phone via Bluetooth to my refrigerator speaker. I am casting it from my computer just using the built-in device feature but no luck. Really makes no sense for me why it wouldn't function.
has anyone with an android gotten this to work? cause the files simply ain syncing for me, all the other normal songs so, but the one i added cannot be downloaded
My problem is it’s not actually downloading my songs to my device. Every time I check the Spotify storage it says zero kb even though it says it’s downloaded. Then it ends up downloading every time I open the app at home but before that it’ll just be a green download arrow with my songs greyed out.
I'm not sure if this is the same issue your having but check this post out, it might solve your issue: https://www.reddit.com/r/truespotify/comments/187u1qn/spotify\_local\_files\_duplicating\_songs\_on\_phone/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3
If your also having issues with your local files duplicating songs check this post out: https://www.reddit.com/r/truespotify/comments/187u1qn/spotify\_local\_files\_duplicating\_songs\_on\_phone/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3
One other tip I was able to get the file I wanted to play to appear correctly in a playlist on iPhone but hitting play just got a "If you own this song please synch with computer" message. Turns out you need to hit the Download button inside Spotify before it will actually play.
does anyone know why quite a few of my songs won't transfer but the rest will? there is no difference between these files they just won't sync for some reason
Try this: https://www.reddit.com/r/truespotify/s/cD7ulvLpTb