One of the most attractive things about owning a smartwatch is being able to leave your phone behind and enjoy music through headphones. Unfortunately, after the death of Google Play Music, the platform was missing a single suitable service that could provide this convenience. However, Spotify is stepping up its game and coming up with an app it should have come up with in the first place.

Instead of just controlling the music playing on your phone, you will finally be able to stream Spotify directly to Wear. More importantly, you will finally be able to download your music and podcasts for offline playback, which is very handy if your watch doesn’t offer mobile connectivity.

The app will also support Spotify Connect, so you can instantly switch playback between different devices.

It’s unclear when exactly the app will be updated, but hopefully it will be soon – or at least as soon as the new Wear OS experience goes live. If Spotify isn’t your choice of music app, you might be happy to know that YouTube Music is also making its way to Wear OS.

More information

We’ve been waiting from Google I / O to find out when Spotify will bring offline listening to Wear OS, especially since the Apple Watch acquired this capability earlier this summer. Considering yesterday’s Unpacked event, what better time to announce its availability alongside the new Galaxy Watch4 and Wear OS 3.

While Spotify’s announcement specifically highlights Samsung’s new wearable devices, any smartwatch running Wear OS 2 or later can download music for offline listening. As long as you’re a paid subscriber, you can select playlists, albums, podcasts, and more to download everything from your watch. The app will highlight the saved music with a green icon, and once you’ve connected bluetooth headphones to your watch, you can start listening without your phone nearby.

Deploy Now

According to several Wear OS users, the update for the Spotify watch app is now live. It appears to be rolling out to all Android Wear 2.0 devices in multiple countries.

Image credit: Reddit user Competitive_Fan_9273

If you don’t see the update, try going to the Applications menu on Wear OS and force shutdown Spotify. This should make the changes visible if they have already been uploaded.

Spotify: listen to podcasts and find the music you love
Spotify: listen to podcasts and find the music you love