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The opinions expressed in this article are the writer’s own and do not reflect the views of Her Campus.
This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Maryland chapter.

The 2023 Spotify Wrapped came out earlier than usual last year, releasing on Nov. 30, 2023. For 2024, listeners anticipated another early release, but were disappointed with its later-than-usual arrival on the morning of Dec. 4. and change in design after lots of teasing from Spotify.

Every year, Spotify Wrapped allows users to look back on their listening habits over the last 12 months. Spotify enhances the immersive experience with funky visuals and users’ top songs that play in the background. 

Moreover, this year’s Wrapped was a lot more simplistic in style. Maybe even too simple. It was still visually appealing but lacked the interesting reveals introduced over the past years. 

Rather than additionally sending users personalized messages from their favorite artists and informing them of their geographic listening habits, Spotify simply summarized their musical stats. 

The 2024 Wrapped presented 12 slides of users’ top songs, artists, genres and average listening times. This was about half the length of last years’ Wrapped, totaling 20 slides. The only new feature was a run-down of three AI-generated words to describe the users’ favorite genres during three different months of the year.

The overall playout of the musical reflection made Spotify Wrapped 2024 feel more rushed than personalized. From the repetitive geometric style to having no new features, this year’s Wrapped felt underwhelming, especially considering its lack of timeliness. 

Instead of sharing their assigned listening characters with funny remarks on their Instagram stories, users felt they could only share the numbers of their music libraries with the limited Wrapped results.

Maybe this simplicity is a good thing. It gets the job done and does not distract from the main idea: how individuals listen to music. However , at the end of the day, it almost takes away some of the excitement of the whole experience. 

People always either bond or fight over their Spotify Wrapped sharings. Nevertheless, it allows them to have a moment to discover themselves as music lovers in the process. 

Rachel Kebler

Maryland '27

Rachel Kebler is a freelance writer for UMD's Her Campus chapter, focusing mainly on music, pop culture, and all other things entertainment. Rachel is a sophomore at UMD double majoring in Journalism and Cinema & Media Studies. In her free time, she enjoys concerts, hiking, reading, museums, and playing guitar. Don't play name that tune with her; you will lose.