SPOTIFY UNVEILS CAR THING, A SMART PLAYER FOR CARS

Car Thing is currently available for free as a limited, by-invitation-only release that is only available in the United States market at this time. The only way for interested users to participate is to sign up for a Spotify Premium subscription waitlist and hope that Spotify contacts them. The Car Thing would normally sell for $79.99 at a retail store near you. It is unclear whether Spotify will conduct product trials outside of the United States.

According to Spotify, the device is not intended to “compete with in-car infotainment systems,” but rather to provide customers with a more “seamless and personalized in-car listening experience.”

According to the brand, “Our focus remains on becoming the world’s number one audio platform – not on developing hardware – but we developed Car Thing because we recognized a need among our users.” “We believe that everyone should be able to enjoy superior listening experiences, regardless of the year or model of their vehicle.”

In addition, we will now be able to bring our entire catalog of music and podcasts to an even broader range of users who drive an even broader range of vehicles thanks to Car Thing.

In addition to being mounted on dashboards, air vents, and CD players, the Car Thing can connect via Bluetooth, AUX, and USB. It comes with a touchscreen, a large navigation dial, voice control, and four assignable preset buttons that can be used to access your favorite music, podcasts, playlists, and news sources.

In other Spotify news, the brand announced this month the launch of Mixes, which are personalized playlists curated by machine learning.