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How do I reverse the order of a Spotify playlist?

reverse the order of a Spotify playlist
Listen up: you can list your latest playlist additions first

Spotify playlists are generally created in chronological order. You add a song to a playlist, it goes to the bottom of the running order. Pretty much as you’d expect. 

But what if you want to have the latest additions at the top? For example, Spotify used to have a Starred playlist, where any music you favourited was added to the playlist, newest items first. 

Spotify did away with the Starred system and now the default behaviour of that playlist is to put the oldest items first, like all the rest. Here’s how to make the new tunes bubble to the top.

How to reverse the order of a Spotify playlist

It’s dead easy to do this in the Spotify desktop app.

Click on your playlist and you’ll see a column listing the date the song was added to the playlist. Click at the top of the column until it shows the songs in the order of newest added first.

reverse the order of a Spotify playlist

That option is hidden away in the mobile apps.

On Android/iOS, go to the playlist of your choice, scroll to the top of the screen and click the three-line hamburger menu next to the ‘search this playlist’ entry.

This unfurls the ‘sort by’ menu, where you can choose which criteria to sort the playlist by. Tap ‘recently added’ and the list will now put the most recently added items at the top.

reverse the order of a Spotify playlist

The list can also be sorted by title, artist or album name. The ‘custom’ option merely returns it to chronological order, or whatever order you’d dragged the playlist into previously. 

Now read this: How do I get the best Spotify sound quality?

About the author

Barry Collins

Barry has scribbled about tech for almost 20 years for The Sunday Times, PC Pro, WebUser, Which? and many others. He was once Deputy Editor of Mail Online and remains in therapy to this day. Email Barry at barry@bigtechquestion.com.

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  • When I tried this on the custom playlist it wouldn’t let me reverse its order. Is there anyway to do this on the custom option under ‘sort by’?

  • I don’t have that option. It doesn’t say anything like that, nor does it have those three little vertical dots for the actual playlist.