Spotify begins rolling out real time lyrics feature to its app

This feature essentially shows users lyrics to the song that they are listening to and it can be seen beneath the album art and music controls for the song that is currently playing.

The new feature is being rolled out to both Android and iOS based apps. (Reuters)

Spotify is one of the most popular music streaming apps in the world. Now, the app is finally getting a feature that enables users to hum the lyrics to a song as they listen to it on their smartphones.

The company has started rolling out real time lyrics feature to its Android and iOS based apps. This feature essentially shows users lyrics to the song that they are listening to and it can be seen beneath the album art and music controls for the song that is currently playing. It is different from the app's 'Behind the Lyrics' feature which shows the complete lyrics to a song.

But there is a caveat. This feature isn't available for all songs yet. You can see a lyrics indicator icon in the playlists before the artist's name to know which tracks are supported. Furthermore, Android Police reports that this feature is not available for all users, not yet at least. The update seems to be a server side update and so, not all users with beta version 8.5.46.848 of the app can use the feature.

Interestingly, the lyrics in Spotify's real time lyrics feature is being provided by Musixmatch. It's the same company Spotify had partnered with nearly nine year back in 2011. However, the two companies had ended their partnership in 2016 with Musixmatch citing 'difference in directions' as the reason for their ended partnership. "It was a great partnership and there is mutual respect between both companies as our business strategies move us each in different directions," Musixmatch had written in a Medium post at the time.

It remains uncertain what has changed in the recent time that has made the two companies rekindle their old partnership, but if all goes well, more people should be able to use the feature soon.