How Does Spotify Heavy Rotation Work?

What is the difference between Played a Track and Heavy Rotation activities?

AE's "Played a Track" activity is based on the data from Spotify's Recently Played endpoint. This only allows us to check the members last 50 plays, so we can't guarantee we will catch every single listen from every member. Which is why we recommend Heavy Rotation as a far more accurate metric of a member's listening habits.

"Heavy Rotation" activity is based on the data collated by Spotify's Top Items endpoint, based on a members last 4 weeks of listens. If a member has been frequently listening to an artist or track it will be caught here.

If a track appears in a member's "Played a track..." activities will it still appear in their "Heavy Rotation" tracks?

Yes, these two activities are handled completely separately at our end. Recording a play in "Played a Track" won't exclude it from "Heavy Rotation" and vice versa.

How often does AE record Heavy Rotation?

A member's Heavy Rotation data is based on up to the last 4 weeks of listening activity and then collated into a top ten list by Spotify. AE then checks this data for the member and matches against any relevant artists or brands from your dashboard. To avoid repetition and data duplication Heavy Rotation data is recorded once per calendar week (52 times per year) for each member.