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

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).