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How to Change Spotify Privacy Settings and Start a Private Session

Use Spotify Private Session to stop sharing listening activity temporarily. Here are the mobile, tablet, and desktop steps, plus what the setting affects.

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To listen without sharing your activity, turn on Private Session in Spotify. On mobile or tablet, go to Profile picture → Settings and privacy → Privacy and social → Listening activity, then switch on Private Session. On desktop, click your profile picture and select Private session.

Turn on Spotify Private Session

On a mobile device or tablet

  1. Tap your profile picture at the top of Spotify.
  2. Tap Settings and privacy.
  3. Tap Privacy and social.
  4. Under Listening activity, switch on Private Session.

On desktop

  1. Click your profile picture at the top of Spotify.
  2. Select Private session.

To end a session yourself, return to the same control and switch it off on mobile or tablet, or select the session option again on desktop. Menu wording and placement may vary by app version, platform, and language. These paths follow Spotify’s current support guidance, retrieved October 4, 2026.

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What Private Session changes—and what it does not

Spotify describes Private Session as listening without sharing listening activity. During the session, your listening does not appear in Friends Activity, your recently played artists do not update on your profile, and Spotify does not use that listening to personalize recommendations. Spotify also says listening during a Private Session does not affect Wrapped. See Spotify’s explanation of private listening.

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The setting applies to your account across devices, including connected TVs and speakers, rather than only the device where you turned it on. Spotify says it automatically turns off after six hours or when Spotify is restarted.

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Private Session controls listening while it is active; it is not a way to erase past listening history, hide all account data, or make your Spotify account anonymous. Spotify’s support page does not claim those broader effects.

For ongoing privacy, review the other controls

Private Session is temporary. If you want to manage activity sharing or profile visibility beyond a single session, review Settings and privacy → Privacy and social. Spotify lists controls there for listening activity sharing, recently played artists, followers and following, public playlists, and whether playlists appear on your profile. The available controls can vary by platform, and defaults may differ by age. Details are in Spotify’s privacy settings guidance.

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Listening activity sharing has a separate control: Spotify lets you turn it on or off and choose who can see it when it is enabled. Those settings apply across devices. Spotify cautions that activity may not update in real time; see Spotify’s Listening Activity guidance.

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