Spotify AppleScript Control

Control the Spotify desktop app using AppleScript. Works reliably with the macOS Spotify app without API rate limits or OAuth.

Requirements

Spotify desktop app installed and running on macOS
No setup required - just works

Quick Start

# Play a playlist
spotify play "spotify:playlist:665eC1myDA8iSepZ0HOZdG"
spotify play "https://open.spotify.com/playlist/665eC1myDA8iSepZ0HOZdG"

# Play an episode
spotify play "spotify:episode:5yJKH11UlF3sS3gcKKaUYx"
spotify play "https://open.spotify.com/episode/5yJKH11UlF3sS3gcKKaUYx"

# Play a track
spotify play "spotify:track:7hQJA50XrCWABAu5v6QZ4i"

# Playback control
spotify pause          # Toggle play/pause
spotify next           # Next track
spotify prev           # Previous track
spotify status         # Current track info

# Volume control
spotify volume 50      # Set volume (0-100)
spotify mute           # Mute
spotify unmute         # Unmute

Spotify CLI Wrapper

The spotify command is a wrapper script at {baseDir}/spotify.sh

Commands

Command	Description	Example
`play <uri>`	Play track/album/playlist/episode	`spotify play spotify:track:xxx`
`pause`	Toggle play/pause	`spotify pause`
`next`	Next track	`spotify next`
`prev`	Previous track	`spotify prev`
`status`	Show current track info	`spotify status`
`volume <0-100>`	Set volume	`spotify volume 75`
`mute`	Mute	`spotify mute`
`unmute`	Unmute	`spotify unmute`

URI Formats

Accepts both Spotify URIs and open.spotify.com URLs:

spotify:track:7hQJA50XrCWABAu5v6QZ4i
https://open.spotify.com/track/7hQJA50XrCWABAu5v6QZ4i
spotify:playlist:665eC1myDA8iSepZ0HOZdG
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/665eC1myDA8iSepZ0HOZdG?si=xxx
spotify:episode:5yJKH11UlF3sS3gcKKaUYx
https://open.spotify.com/episode/5yJKH11UlF3sS3gcKKaUYx
spotify:album:xxx
spotify:artist:xxx

The script auto-converts URLs to URIs.

Direct AppleScript Commands

For more control, use AppleScript directly:

# Play
osascript -e 'tell application "Spotify" to play track "spotify:playlist:xxx"'

# Pause/Play toggle
osascript -e 'tell application "Spotify" to playpause'

# Next/Previous
osascript -e 'tell application "Spotify" to next track'
osascript -e 'tell application "Spotify" to previous track'

# Get current track
osascript -e 'tell application "Spotify"
  set trackName to name of current track
  set artistName to artist of current track
  return trackName & " by " & artistName
end tell'

# Get player state
osascript -e 'tell application "Spotify" to player state'

# Set volume (0-100)
osascript -e 'tell application "Spotify" to set sound volume to 75'

# Get current position (in seconds)
osascript -e 'tell application "Spotify" to player position'

# Set position (in seconds)
osascript -e 'tell application "Spotify" to set player position to 30'

Available Properties

tell application "Spotify"
  name of current track          -- Track name
  artist of current track        -- Artist name
  album of current track         -- Album name
  duration of current track      -- Duration in ms
  player position                -- Position in seconds
  player state                   -- playing/paused/stopped
  sound volume                   -- 0-100
  repeating                      -- true/false
  repeating enabled              -- true/false
  shuffling                      -- true/false
  shuffling enabled              -- true/false
end tell

Examples

Agent Usage

When the user says:

"Play my power hour playlist" → extract playlist URI and run spotify play <uri>
"Pause the music" → run spotify pause
"Next track" → run spotify next
"What's playing?" → run spotify status

Play a specific episode

spotify play https://open.spotify.com/episode/5yJKH11UlF3sS3gcKKaUYx

Get full track info

osascript -e 'tell application "Spotify"
  return "Track: " & (name of current track) & "\nArtist: " & (artist of current track) & "\nAlbum: " & (album of current track) & "\nState: " & (player state as string)
end tell'

Installation

The skill is self-contained. To make the spotify command available system-wide:

chmod +x {baseDir}/spotify.sh
sudo ln -sf {baseDir}/spotify.sh /usr/local/bin/spotify

Or add the skill directory to PATH.

Troubleshooting

"Spotify got an error"

Make sure Spotify desktop app is running
Spotify must be launched at least once to accept AppleScript commands

Play command does nothing

Verify the URI format is correct
Try playing from Spotify app first to ensure the content exists

No audio

Check system volume and Spotify app volume
Ensure correct output device is selected in Spotify preferences

Limitations

Requires Spotify desktop app to be running
macOS only (uses AppleScript)
Cannot search or browse library (use web interface or app for discovery)
Cannot manage playlists (add/remove tracks)

For playlist management and search, use the web interface or consider the spotify-player skill (requires OAuth setup).

spotify-applescript