Happy Spotify Wrapped day to those who celebrate.
Since 2016, at the end of November or early December, Spotify has allowed users to view a compilation of data on their activity on the platform over the past year in a visually appealing, storytelling-like format. From telling users how many minutes of music they’ve listened to, their top songs and artists of the year, the platform lays it out so you can see your music, podcast, and now audio book listening trends from the year.
While most people are diving into the Spotify Wrapped solely for the purpose of seeing how many minutes of music they listened to this year or to see what their top five artists and songs of the year are, which are often shared on social media, (This is your early reminder that I DO want to see what you’ve been listening to this year), Spotify also includes some “fun” aspects of Wrapped, each year creating a new piece of information to share with their users about their listening trends.
During the 2021 Wrapped drop, Spotify gave you your “Audio Aura,” which helped identify your aura based on the music you reached for most. And it was actually pretty cool. I’m not very into auras, but rereading what each color was associated with while working on this blog shows the direct tie between music and emotion.
Last year, Spotify tried a little too hard in the creative department when releasing Wrapped. The platform pinpointed three months, told you which genre you leaned into the most, and compared that to genres from other months. Spotify tagged this segment of Wrapped as your “2024 Musical Evolution.” However, how Spotify chooses the genres’ names during this “musical evolution” was insane. For example, my May evolution was titled “Equestrian Western Country” and included artists like Chris Stapleton, Zach Top, and Toby Keith. But why did they need to add “equestrian” before that? If you want to call me a horse girl, I hate to break it to you, but I’ve been beating those allegations since the 2nd grade.
Some other interesting genre names that Spotify came up with last year included “Wild West Tavern Country Folk,” which sounds objectively awesome, “Boujee Clean Rap Crunk,” “Boujee Football Rap Season,” “Pink Pilates Princess Hollywood Pop,” “Wild West Cowboy Country Americana,” “Pumpkin Spice Western Sad Country,” and “Witchy Cowboy Country Americana.”
This year, Spotify must’ve seen fan reactions to that and decided to switch up the fun segment of Wrapped, keeping it a little simpler. In the 2025 Spotify Wrapped, they revealed your “Listening Age.” According to Chart Data, Spotify calculated your listening age “based on the release years of your top tracks and comparisons to other listeners in your age group.”
While some people’s ages reflected a younger age due to listening to new artists or fresh releases, it appears the vast majority of Spotify users found out they are verified PawPaws—but country music fans who tend to lean toward the traditional side of the genre already knew this.
I was expecting my age to be older than my 20-something years, given I love some Waylon, Lynyrd Skynyrd, and a good disco track. But after seeing that my top artists of the year included Carter Faith, Willow Avalon, and Laci Kaye Booth, all young female powerhouses, I thought that might skew my listening age to be a little younger. But I was wrong, I was labeled a 68-year-old based on my music listening habits.
So it seems the listening age isn’t entirely accurate based on your top listening habits; instead, it’s a more comprehensive deep dive into your listening trends.
And it appears I was not the only one given an age much older than expected. Many Spotify users quickly hopped on social media to share that their listening age… well, aged them. I mean, we always say that music from the ’60s, ’70s, ’80s, or ’90s was of a different caliber than music released today, so maybe this is a good sign that younger generations are getting one thing right and have a keen sense of taste in music.
I will take this listening age addition to Spotify Wrapped over the chaos of last year’s musical evolution, but it still elicited some pretty funny reactions online. Check out a few of my comments:
