spotatui

A fast music player for the terminal and the desktop, written in Rust.
Spotify through its own built-in client, plus local files, Subsonic/Navidrome, internet radio, YouTube and Qobuz, and Apple Music on macOS.

Install · Docs · Desktop app · Contributing · Discord

Table of Contents

• About
• Installation
• Quickstart
• Sources
• Learn more
• Contributing
• Song History
• Star History
• Maintainers
• Code signing policy
• spotatui Contributors

About

spotatui is a music player for the terminal, with a desktop app in preview. Spotify is optional: it is one of seven sources.

• Synced lyrics, and a real-time audio visualizer.
• A play queue that mixes tracks from different sources.
• Playlist sync: mirror one playlist onto Spotify, Qobuz, Subsonic or YouTube.
• Lua plugins for commands, keys, popups and themes.
• An AI DJ inside the app, or your coding agent as the DJ over MCP.
• A local listening history with stats and a shareable recap.
• A CLI for playback, search and playlists.

Spotify needs Premium. spotatui logs in with its own built-in client, so you need no developer app and no client ID.

spotatui started as a fork of spotify-tui and has since grown its own player, sources and desktop app.

Installation

Spotify is optional: every other source works without an account.

System	Command
macOS, Linux, WSL	curl -fsSL https://spotatui.com/install.sh | bash
Windows	irm https://spotatui.com/install.ps1 | iex or winget install spotatui
Arch Linux	yay -S spotatui-bin
With Rust	cargo install --locked spotatui

Homebrew, Nix, Void, .deb packages and building from source are in the installation guide.

• Desktop app: download the installer for your system from the latest release. See Desktop app.
• Features per build: the prebuilt terminal binaries include every source, the MCP server and the AI DJ. cargo install builds Spotify only unless you add the features, and the Nix flake builds Spotify only.
• Updates: the terminal app updates itself. If a package manager installed it, set behavior.disable_auto_update: true. See Updating.

Quickstart

Run spotatui. The first launch asks which sources you want. Pick Spotify to log in: spotatui shows a code and opens Spotify's pairing page, where you confirm it.

Then:

• ? lists every key.
• / searches. Choose the Songs panel with the arrow keys, press Enter to go into it, and Enter again to play a track.
• d switches the source and the device.
• z queues a track, and Shift+Q opens the queue.
• spotatui --help shows the CLI.

Sources

Source	You need
Spotify	A Premium account
Local Files	A music folder
Subsonic / Navidrome	A server account
Internet Radio	Nothing (30k+ stations from radio-browser.info)
YouTube	yt-dlp on your PATH
Qobuz	A paid Qobuz account
Apple Music	macOS and the Music app

Local Files, Subsonic, Internet Radio, YouTube and Qobuz play through spotatui's own audio engine. Apple Music plays in the Music app, and spotatui is its remote. The setup of each source is in Configuration.

Spotify plays in spotatui itself, on any Spotify Connect device, or on Cast and Connect speakers on your network. See Where Spotify plays.

Learn more

You want to	Read
Install another way, or build from source	Installation
Change settings, keys or the theme	Configuration, Keybindings, Themes
Control spotatui from your shell	CLI
Write or install a Lua plugin	PLUGINS.md, Scripting API
Let an AI pick the music	AI DJ, MCP setup
Report a bug	New issue, with a spotatui --debug log
Everything else	All docs

Contributing

spotatui is built by a small team and a growing group of contributors, and you do not need to write code to help. Start with CONTRIBUTING.md, or pick a good first issue.

Native playback and Spotify Connect run on our librespot fork, spotatui-librespot. It is part of the project: a merged PR there counts as a spotatui contribution. See Contributing to the librespot fork.

Song History

Star History

Maintainers

• LargeModGames (@LargeModGames on X)
• shilicioo
• 2570165831
• Oud

Originally forked from spotify-tui by Alexander Keliris. The spotify-tui contributors and the libraries spotatui uses are in CREDITS.md.

Code signing policy

Free code signing provided by SignPath.io, certificate by SignPath Foundation.

The Windows release files are built from this repository by the release workflow on GitHub-hosted runners. Each signing request is approved by hand.

• Committers and reviewers: LargeModGames, ThatModGames, shilicioo, 2570165831, Oud
• Approvers: LargeModGames

Privacy: see the privacy policy for the data spotatui sends and how to turn each part off.

spotatui Contributors

Everyone who helped, with code or without. To get on this list, see Recognition.

LargeModGames 💻 📖 🚧 🤔 🚇 ⚠️	shilicioo 💻 🚧	2570165831 💻 🚧	Oud 💻 🚧	MysteriousWolf 💻	rawcode1337 💻 🐛	copeison 📦
jacklorusso 📖	H41L33 📖	LordMZTE 💻 📦	Sebastian Sarco 💻	Sergio Tabernero Hernández 💻 📦	David Novakovic 💻	Paul 🎨 💻
Arun Felix 💻 🐛	MaySeikatsu 💻 📖 📦	Lorenzo Bodini 💻 🎨	Vi1i Petal 💻 🐛	Will Sturgeon 💻 🐛	wfinken 💻 🐛	Jacob 📦
Dominick Lee 💻	Higor Prado 💻	Vitali Kaplich 📖	knth 💻	Lorelei Noble 💻	Ben Allen 💻	Thomas Allan 💻
Pratyoosh Prakash 💻 🐛	Tahmid Ahmed 💻	Ritze 💻 🐛	Hansen 📖	Yusuke Hayashi 💻 📖	Felix 💻	Dino Leung 📦
Szabó István 📖	Alessandro Zanni 💻	nohint404 💻	TongTong0828 💻	Hi-1mYara 💻 📖	Yvoo 💻	Maurice Schmicking 💻
Tayfur Yıldız 💻	Vladimir Babin 💻	Kratos 💻	niukanen1 💻	Trevor Satori 💻 🐛	Y.B. 💻	Ufuk Emre Yücetürk 💻
WaterWhisperer 📖	Marc Bauer 💻 💵	RohithPariki 💻	Muaaz Bhyat 💻	점[dot] 💻	Samuel 📖	TastyHeadphones 📖
Michael 💻	Battlelamb 📖 💻	markus 📖	Drying 📖	Gaurav Vijay Jadhav 💻	Anand B 💻	AAA 📖 💻

This project follows the all-contributors specification. Contributions of any kind welcome!