Gustav Soderström, one of Spotify’s new co-CEOs, has been at the helm of the Swedish streaming giant for just two months. But it’s really made its mark with a range of features designed to give users more control over how they consume music. His latest move, revealed on stage at this year’s SXSW yesterday (March 13), allows listeners to tweak Spotify’s interpretation to their personal taste.
Users will soon be able to review and edit their taste profile, the algorithmic summary of their preferences that make up their homepage, created playlists and experiences like Spotify Wrapped. They can then ask more or less for a specific genre, artist, or even “vibe,” and directly guide how the recommendation engine responds.
“Taste is not reality. “It’s a choice,” Soderstrom said while speaking at SXSW.
Söderström and fellow co-CEO Alex Norström took over the Stockholm-based company in January, after longtime boss Daniel Ek stepped down at the end of 2025 to become Spotify’s CEO. Both are veterans: Soderstrom has been at Spotify for 17 years and Norstrom for 15 years.
The duo previously served as co-presidents, with Soderstrom also serving as chief product and technology officer and Norstrom as chief business officer. They will maintain their focus on product and business, respectively, but say they plan to synchronize their work rather than running separate fiefdoms with distinct teams and meetings.
Even before becoming co-CEO, Soderstrom has been ramping up Spotify’s product cadence, with the company rolling out 50 new features and updates in the past year. Recent launches include the Prompted Playlist tool, introduced in January, which creates personalized playlists based on user prompts and listening history, and Spotify DJ, an interactive AI assistant first released in 2023.
The updated taste profile is based on these customization bets. Users will be able to see how Spotify “reads” their listening habits — for example, noticing that they leaned more towards alternative rock or hip-hop in the ’90s — and then push the system in a new direction. Writing comments like “I want to start listening to more Justin Bieber” will drive that preference through their recommendations.
Personalization is also key to Spotify’s broader strategy to dominate not just music, but also podcasts and audiobooks. The company has expanded its video podcast offerings through partnerships with platforms like Netflix and doubled the size of its audiobook business while moving to Physical book sales. Spotify now has 751 million monthly active users and accounts for about 3.5 percent of the world’s population as subscribers, and aims to increase that number to 10 percent or even 15 percent.
The new Taste Profile features will be rolled out to discerning listeners in New Zealand in the coming weeks before expanding more widely. Users can subscribe to adjust their preferences, or continue listening as they always have.
