How to Download Music from Spotify to Computer
Q: "Can I download music from Spotify to my computer? By doing this, I can listen to Spotify music offline and burn them to CDs on a computer. I have been trying for a few days but have no luck. I am not tech-savvy. Anyone know the magic to download Spotify songs to computer?"
With a Spotify Premium subscription, there is an option to get offline playback. That's to say, only if you upgrade to a paid account, you can enjoy the feature to download Spotify music to computer. But what if you are a free Spotify user? No matter which situation you are under, in this post, we will introduce two easy ways to make it possible.
Part 1. How to Download Music from Spotify to Computer with Premium
There are three tiers you can choose from to access over 50 million songs via the Spotify app or its web player. They are Spotify Free, Spotify Premium ($9.99 every month), as well as Spotify Family ($14.99 per month). When you update one of the premium plans, Spotify gives you permission of downloading Spotify music to PC.
It's worth mentioning that Spotify doesn't allow you to download individual songs directly. It's necessary to create a new playlist for storing your individual songs. Anyway, the operation process is easy to perform. Let's see how to download music from Spotify to computer with Premium.
Step 1. Open the Spotify app on your PC or Mac and log into your Premium account details.
Step 2. Please create a new playlist to add individual songs. Or you can directly find your favorite playlists that you'd like to download to your computer.
Step 3. Tap the playlist, you will see there is a 'Download' icon. Just switch it to the right so that the toggle turns green.
Step 4. Now, Spotify playlists will be downloaded to your computer immediately and automatically.
Where to Find Spotify Music Downloads on Computer
Spotify is different from other streaming music services. You can easily locate and distribute the songs downloaded from other platforms. But there is not a direct option to locate downloaded Spotify tracks with a Premium account.
Downloaded Spotify tracks are cache files with encryption. Here, we will take PC as an example to explain how to find Spotify music downloads on your computer.
- Step 1. Launch Spotify desktop client.
- Step 2. Go to Settings > Show Advanced Settings > Offline Songs Storage.
- Step 3. You will be able to check the location where your songs downloaded. In general, C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Spotify\Storage is the default location.
- Step 3. Go to the folder, you will find the encrypted Spotify cache files.
Notes: Because Spotify songs are cache files, you can transfer them to other devices. Besides, you even can't use other music players on your computer to play them. Once you cancel Spotify Premium, downloaded Spotify files will disappear from your computer.
Part 2. How to Download Spotify Songs to Computer for Free
If you'd like to get rid of all limitations of Spotify playback mentioned above, you can skip to this section. Here, we will introduce a unique workaround to download Spotify songs to computer.
Let's get help from a third-party Spotify music downloader to download Spotify songs to PC and Mac. I'd recommend you to have a try at DRmare Spotify Music Converter. This software supports to download songs from Spotify to computer for free. Of couse, it's also availble for Spotify Premium users to download Spotify playlist to computer.
And it's able to convert them to MP3, M4A, M4B, AAC, WAV, FLAC in batch with up to 5X faster speed. Yet, it can archive the downloaded Spotify songs in your computer folder. For more features of it, you can check them below.
DRmare Spotify Music Converter
- Download Spotify individual songs to local computer for free
- Download Spotify music, playlists, albums, podcasts, audiobooks losslessly
- Convert Spotify music to MP3, WAV, FLAC, AAC, and more
- Keep 100% original audio quality and ID3 tags
- Step 1Add Spotify playlists and songs for download
- There are two methods to add Spotify music for download. One is to drag the songs you want from Spotify and drop them to DRmare Software's main screen. The other is to use the '+' button and the Spotify track link to load them.
- Step 2Customize Spotify output format for download
- This step is optional. In general, DRmare Spotify Music Converter will set the output format as MP3 by default. But it also enables users to customize it and other audio parameters manually. Please click the top-right icon to choose 'Preferences' > 'Convert' to do it.
- Step 3Download Spotify playlist to computer
- To download songs on Spotify, please simply press the big 'Convert' button. It will change to the 'Cancel' button. In the downloading window, there is a real-time conversion process. After conversion, you can locate local Spotify files on your computer by choosing the 'history' > 'search' icon.
- Video DemoDownload Spotify songs to computer
Part 3. In Conclusion
You can download Spotify songs to computer with Premium, but the files are encrypted. You can't distribute them to other devices and players. You even couldn't take full control of the music playback.
Considering this, the second way is a better way to download music from Spotify to computer. It can help you keep Spotify songs forever and play them anywhere.
