Implement an actual shuffle function

[RoninTheOrigina]

Yes, you read that right.  The "shuffle" function in Spotify is nothing more than a randomizer.  There's a difference?  YES.

RANDOM - Play one song.  The next song can be ANY song in your playlist.  Including the one you just listened to.  Though I've never had this specifically happen, I literally just heard the same song that I heard 2 songs ago.  This is how Spotify's "shuffle" currently functions.

SHUFFLE - Take your entire list, shuffle them (like cards), and play the first song in the shuffle.  Once finished, move that song off the pile.  Once the pile is depleted, shuffle the deck again and start over (maybe pop a message up).

I know enough about programming (not much) to know that shuffling is probably a bit harder than random, but come on.  I may be in the minority, but I don't have a lot of little playlists.  I have one list with nearly a thousand songs in it, because I like all the music, and am rarely not in the mood for one of those songs.  But what I can't stand is hearing the same song over and over again.  I think there may even be songs in my list I haven't heard yet, while I've heard others 4-5 times.

I know it may not matter much, but I would probably lay down the money for at least a year subscription if this feature was implemented.

EDIT: Another user pointed out that I can see what all is queued up in my shuffle by clicking the Play Queue link, and that Spotify supposedly sets up a rolling shuffle of 50 songs.  It would be nice if this range could be expanded to say 50-100% of your playlist.

EDIT 4/6/12: I just dealt with the same song 16 tracks later.  The song played the first time yesterday afternoon.  I went home, listened for a bit on my home PC (just a few songs), then started listening again this morning.  If the list recycles itself after a day, or if you log in from another computer, I see that as an area for improvement.

[jfk3019]

one big problem I've noticed with the shuffle is that if I pause a song while in shuffle for more than a minute, when I press play it shuffles all the songs again, in including ones that have played. This happens if you are on a different app on your phone for a minute then switch back to Spotify. Everything gets reset. Ridiculous

[SnackyD]

How did I know the work-around would hurt more...

Thanks for the tips. My current plan is to just keep smaller playlists
(which I'll do by habit). The horrifying part comes when I run out of
playlists, or have to expand existing ones....maybe I'll just make myself
sick of every song so I won't care when it expires.

[Katrien]

I've got a playlist of 3000 numbers and still the shuffle function manage to play everytime the same numbers in the same order.  More then 90% from my playlist i never here and it is getting really boring to hear always the same!

[MartinStoichkov]

Hey @Katrien, thanks for your contribution! 

A few similar ideas has also been suggested here, here and here : ) 

Please add your votes and comments there to show your support! 

In the meantime, when you uncheck and check the shuffle it refreshing your queue!

[shadowlest]

This problem is making me really want to go back to Apple Music.

Is just a simple feature what we used centuries ago and....spotify cant make this work fine, this is frustrating

[12161142593]

I really like Spotify! , but  I think the shuffle option could be much better, because I don´t think it really shuffle the songs you know? they are always playing the same songs every time I choose this function and it´s getting annoying... thats all 🙂

[mirijo]

Spotify shuffle is so frustrating to use...

I have a few playlists I listen to regularly. One of them is all of my favorite Bastille songs, containing songs from two different albums; the other is a playlist of my favorite songs from a variety of musicals, containing probably 5-6 different musicals. I have essentially the same issue with both of them:

On the Bastille playlist, Spotify will play all of the songs from one album and then all of the songs from the other album. Granted, the songs are shuffled within the album--e.g. it will play Album 1 Track 3, then A1 T5, A1 T8, A1 T1, etc. After going through all of the songs for one album, it will then shuffle all of the songs on the other album. 

The same issue is even more apparent on my playlist for musicals. It will play, for example, every song from Spring Awakening, then every song from Next to Normal, then every song from Newsies... when what I want is to be able to have them truly shuffled together. 

The date of the original post here is 2012-03-22. It's marked as implemented, but there are still dozens of very recent comments complaining about the issue. That means that this has been an ongoing issue for five years. Spotify, please pay attention to this and fix this for real!

[rednblu]

@Katrien and @mirijo,

You are right!  But please don't give up on Spotify-- Spotify is the best-- You just have to do your own simple "programming fixes" to correct the bugs in all of Spotify's players-- Then you can enjoy the best of Spotify . . . .  

Spoiler

Even for Tracks = 60, the Spotify shuffling N^N is more than [ 6.022 x 10^23 ] times the value of N!-- Do you know << Avogadro's Number? >> 

(I laugh at the Spotify designer, God herself)--

Thus, it is very unlikely you will ever find that one atom of NonRepeat play in any lifetime of sampling what the Spotify shuffle gives you for any playlist of 1000 tracks-- No matter how many times you flick that Spotify shuffle Off and On.

Just save your first set of "Next Tracks" to a playlist-- Then Shuffle Off and On again and copy every set of Spotify'sAlternativeShuffleFacts "Next Tracks" to that first set of "Next Tracks" and you will get that "Duplicate Songs" message for every shuffle in your whole lifetime.

For all of the above reasons, my friends showed me "programming fixes" to use a truly Shuffled deck of tracks done outside Spotify using, for example, << this site. >> 

There is a simple trick for getting your playlist out and back into Spotify.

And I never get an unRequested repeat-- ever-- thanks to my friends who showed me their "programming fixes" for the bugs in all of Spotify's players.

[mayazcherquoi]

You just have to do your own simple "programming fixes" to correct the bugs in all of Spotify's players

---

That's assuming that Spotify actually bothers to heed community wishes. I made a similar "wish" which has now been merged into this thread -- a thread I had no idea existed, nor had nearly 90 pages of comments from users all wishing for the same feature! A wish that should not have needed to be made in the first place, given the music software industry ran into this problem quite early on many years ago, prior to the existence of Spotify!

Unfortunately, the only thing that we as a community can do is to move to Spotify competitors and resist giving Spotify our subscription money. You won't be missing any songs, they all contain the same (if not more) catalogue of music. Hurting their bottom line stings the most, and will force them to implement change.

I am sick and tired of hearing the same tracks or artists repeated over and over again when I hit "Shuffle Play". This, along with the myriad of other bugs present on the Spotify platform has ushered me away from the service.