Get a Custom Playlist with Spotify’s ‘Soundtrack Your Workout’ Tool

Get a Custom Playlist with Spotify’s ‘Soundtrack Your Workout’ Tool

Bored with your workout mix? Us too. Especially if you’ve been working out at home — alone — for the duration of the pandemic, it’s unsurprising that you’re tired of listening to the same music, and perfectly understandable if you also feel overwhelmed at the idea of making a fresh playlist for each and every session.

You may be able to find a happy medium with Spotify’s new Soundtrack Your Workout tool, which uses your stated preferences to automatically program a playlist for you covering a specific activity and length of time.

Spotify already offers plenty of personalised playlists based on your listening habits in its “Made For You” section, but the advantage of Soundtrack Your Workout is that you can customise it yourself to fit different types of workouts without having to hand-select individual songs or podcast episodes.

To get started, you’ll need to open the tool in a browser window — you can’t do it within your desktop or mobile app. You’ll be prompted to log in to your Spotify account before you can begin.

Soundtrack Your Workout will then take you through seven quiz questions to determine your preferences:

Screenshot: Emily Long
Screenshot: Emily Long

  • How long your session will be (15, 30, 60 or 90 minutes, or more than two hours)
  • Whether you want podcasts, music or both (you can select only one if your workout is 15 minutes long) and whether you’re OK with explicit content
  • Your workout type (Pilates, yoga, running, lifting, etc.)
  • Who you’re working out with (alone, a partner, your dog, etc.)
  • Your “vibe” — from “totally zen” to “ready to dance”
  • You preferred music or podcast genre(s)

From there, you can add a title and optional image to your playlist and tap “Soundtrack My Workout.” When the next screen loads, tap the “Listen Now” button to view your playlist in a new window. Because you’re logged into Spotify, it’ll sync with your account and also appear in your Playlists on the desktop and mobile apps.

Screenshot: Emily Long
Screenshot: Emily Long

When we tried it, we got some interesting results — it seems like Spotify somewhat accounts for both your listening history and the preferences you enter into the tool. Part of the fun is seeing what it recommends based on what it thinks you’ll like, which may not be what you’d expect.

You can make as many of your own playlists as you need for as many workouts as you want, but we put together a few for you to enjoy:

  • RUN AROUND (60 minutes) from Lifehacker Editor in Chief Alice Bradley

  • Nerds on a Bike (30 minutes) from Lifehacker Managing Editor Joel Cunningham

  • LIFT ALL THE THINGS (90 minutes) from Lifehacker Senior Health Editor Beth Skwarecki


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