Spotify users are now able to see what their friends are listening to in real-time and start shared listening sessions as part of the platform’s expansion of its in-app messaging feature.

The streaming giant launched its direct messaging feature in August 2025, which according to Spotify, was meant to make sharing music and other content easier.

Since the messaging feature’s launch, nearly 40 million users have sent about 340 million messages, the company revealed.

Spotify is now rolling out listening activity, an opt-in feature that displays what music a user is currently playing to their contacts on Spotify Messages. If the user isn’t playing a song, their recently played tracks will be displayed instead.

Users can tap on a friend’s listening activity to add tracks to their library, start playback, or react with emojis. The feature must be manually enabled through privacy and social settings and users have the option to turn it off.

“Listening activity is only shared with people you’ve already messaged on Spotify, and you’re always in control—only the contacts you choose can see your activity, and you can turn it off at any time.”

Spotify

Spotify explained that “Listening activity is only shared with people you’ve already messaged on Spotify, and you’re always in control—only the contacts you choose can see your activity, and you can turn it off at any time.”

The platform also rolled out Request to Jam, which allows users to invite friends into live listening sessions directly from message threads.

Spotify launched its Jam feature in September 2023, allowing up to 32 users to collectively build a playlist in real-time.

Spotify said: “With Jam, users can listen from anywhere—but it can be hard to know when your friends are available to listen together when you’re apart. Now, users can see when someone is already listening, join them, and even message in sync while listening so they can talk about what’s playing and what’s up next.”

Since the launch, daily active users of Spotify’s Jam feature have more than doubled year over year, according to the company.

“Now, users can see when someone is already listening, join them, and even message in sync while listening so they can talk about what’s playing and what’s up next.”

Spotify

Both new features started rolling out to users in Messages-enabled markets on iOS and Android devices and will be widely available by early February. Listening activity is available to all users with Messages access, while Request to Jam requires at least one Premium subscriber.

Spotify has been testing and rolling out new features in recent months to improve user experience. Last month, the platform launched a new feature called Prompted Playlist that lets users enter text prompts to build personalized playlists.

In November, Spotify integrated with third-party service TuneMyMusic to let users transfer playlists from rival music services, similar to a tool that Apple Music and YouTube Music have already introduced to attract more subscribers.

That same month, Spotify launched more detailed song credits in an effort to engage listeners more deeply with their favorite music. Previously, Spotify’s song credits included topline performers, songwriters and producers. The new credits expand that to include “all of the contributors who make each song possible,” including background vocalists, musicians, and engineers.

Music Business Worldwide

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The Minneapolis gathering was one of hundreds of protests planned in towns and cities across the country over the weekend. It came in a city on edge since the killing of Renee Good on Wednesday by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer.

“We’re all living in fear right now,” said Meghan Moore, a mother of two from Minneapolis who joined the protest Saturday. “ICE is creating an environment where nobody feels safe and that’s unacceptable.”

On Friday night, a protest outside a Minneapolis hotel that attracted about 1,000 people turned violent as demonstrators threw ice, snow and rocks at officers, Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara said Saturday. One officer suffered minor injuries after being struck with a piece of ice, O’Hara said. Twenty-nine people were cited and released, he said.

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey stressed that while most protests have been peaceful, those who cause damage to property or put others in danger will be arrested. He faulted “agitators that are trying to rile up large crowds.”

“This is what Donald Trump wants,” Frey said of the president who has demanded massive immigration enforcement efforts in several U.S. cities. “He wants us to take the bait.”

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz echoed the call for peace.

“Trump sent thousands of armed federal officers into our state, and it took just one day for them to kill someone,” Walz posted on social media. “Now he wants nothing more than to see chaos distract from that horrific action. Don’t give him what he wants.”

Communities unite in frustration

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security says its deployment of immigration officers in the Twin Cities is its biggest ever immigration enforcement operation. Trump’s administration has said both shootings were acts of self-defense against drivers who “weaponized” their vehicles to attack officers.

Connor Maloney said he was attending the Minneapolis protest to support his community and because he’s frustrated with the immigration crackdown.

“Almost daily I see them harassing people,” he said. “It’s just sickening that it’s happening in our community around us.”

He was among thousands of protesters, including children, who braved sub-freezing temperatures and a light dusting of snow, carrying handmade signs saying declaring, “De-ICE Minnesota!” and “ICE melts in Minnesota.”

They marched down a street that is home to restaurants and stores where various nationalities and cultures are celebrated in colorful murals.

Steven Eubanks, 51, said he felt compelled to attend a protest in Durham, North Carolina, on Saturday because of the “horrifying” killing in Minneapolis.

“We can’t allow it,” Eubanks said. “We have to stand up.”

Indivisible, a social movement organization that formed to resist the Trump administration, said hundreds of protests were scheduled in Texas, Kansas, New Mexico, Ohio, Florida and other states.

ICE activity across Minneapolis

In Minneapolis, a coalition of migrant rights groups organized the demonstration that began in a park about half a mile from the residential neighborhood where the 37-year-old Good was shot on Wednesday.

But the large protest apparently did not deter federal officers from operating in the city.

A couple of miles away, just as the demonstration began, an Associated Press photographer witnessed heavily armed officers — at least one in Border Patrol uniform — approach a person who had been following them. Two of the agents had long guns out when they ordered the person to stop following them, telling him it was his “first and final warning.”

The agents eventually drove onto the interstate without detaining the driver.

Protests held in the neighborhood have been largely peaceful, and in general there has been minimal law enforcement presence, in contrast to the violence that hit Minneapolis in the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd in 2020. Near the airport, some confrontations erupted on Thursday and Friday between smaller groups of protesters and officers guarding the federal building used as a base for the Twin Cities crackdown.

O’Hara said city police officers have responded to calls about cars abandoned because their drivers have been apprehended by immigration enforcement. In one case, a car was left in park and a dog was left inside another.

He said immigration enforcement activities are happening “all over the city” and that 911 callers have been alerting authorities to ICE activity, arrests and abandoned vehicles.

The Trump administration has deployed thousands of federal officers to Minnesota under a sweeping new crackdown tied in part to allegations of fraud involving Somali residents. More than 2,000 officers were taking part.

Lawmakers snubbed

Three congresswomen from Minnesota attempted to tour the ICE facility in the Minneapolis federal building on Saturday morning and were initially allowed to enter but then told they had to leave about 10 minutes later.

U.S, Reps. Ilhan Omar, Kelly Morrison and Angie Craig accused ICE agents of obstructing members of Congress from fulfilling their duty to oversee operations there.

A federal judge last month temporarily blocked the Trump administration from enforcing policies that limit congressional visits to immigration facilities. The ruling stems from a lawsuit filed by 12 members of Congress who sued in Washington, D.C. to challenge ICE’s amended visitor policies after they were denied entry to detention facilities.