Spotify Lyrics Just Launched: How To See Them On Mobile And Desktop

Spotify Lyrics were released this week for all users, on both desktop and mobile devices. The lyrics system in Spotify does not provide lyrics for every single song on the platform, but "many of your favorite tracks" will appear with lyrics in real time once your Spotify client's Lyrics system is activated. New lyrics are "added every day" to this system, so a relatively well known artist may not have lyrics in the system today, but might tomorrow – you'll just need to keep checking.

If you're using a smartphone or a tablet, you'll need to have the latest version of the Spotify app to get this process started. You'll need to tap the "Now playing" bar at the bottom of your screen if you're on a smartphone, or the album artwork in the side menu if you're on a tablet.

At this point you'll see Lyrics in a place and form that depends on your app and the song you're playing. If you're playing a track from an album with cover art that's mostly blue, you'll likely see a light blue panel with "Lyrics" on it, while a multicolored album cover with mostly cool colors might have a Lyrics panel that's a darker olive green.

You should be able to pull up on this panel or tap this panel to access lyrics for your song of choice. You should also see an option to expand lyrics for full screen view. Once you view lyrics in full screen mode, there should be a "square with up arrow" icon or the "three dots connected with two lines" icon in the bottom-right of your screen. Highlight your favorite lyrics and tap this button to Share said lyrics to your social media app of choice.

Some users may not have the social sharing feature available at launch. If you have an Android 12 device, for example, you should be able to see lyrics, but the share icon won't necessarily be available for tapping here at launch. If you do not see an icon in the lower right-hand corner of your full-screen lyrics, you may need to restart your device and try again – or double-check that you have the latest version of the app.

Desktop Spotify users will need to start playing a song and tap the tiny microphone icon in the lower-right corner of their screen. The lyrics shown here can also be shared to all manner of social networks. Lyrics for music tracks at launch were licensed and provided by Musixmatch.