Spotify’s free users can now pick songs, but there is a small catch

If you’re a free user on Spotify, you can now find any song you want and listen to it.

The streaming giant is introducing the new feature “Pick and Play,” alongside “Search and Play,” which enables users to search for any song and play it instantly. If someone (either a friend or an artist) shares a song, free users can now listen to it right away with “Share and Play.”

Also included in Spotify’s press release was the addition of real-time lyrics, Discover Weekly, and expanding the usage of playlists (playlist covers, Spotify-created playlists, Daylists) to the free version of the streaming service.

There is one big caveat, however; it isn’t unlimited.

According to TechCrunch, the announcement post conveniently omits that Spotify will only provide a certain allocation of what the company calls “on-demand time.” There hasn’t been any mention of how much will be allocated for the on-demand time, and if free users hit the limit, they will be restricted to a certain number of skips per hour. As expected, the allocated time will reset daily.

Spotify has been focusing on its premium experience recently, finally adding lossless audio and adding an audiobooks+ add-on, which gives premium listeners 15 additional hours of audiobook listening time.

Source: Android Authority