Spotify did make in-car hardware, but it’s not for the general audience

About this time last year, the industry speculation pointed to Spotify working on its own hardware for use in cars. Now, the company has released some insights on that project. The most notable news is that while Spotify has created an in-auto device, it’s not for consumer use.

The rather adorably-named Car Thing is being used by Spotify to test and observe how people are listening to audio in their vehicles. It is a voice-controlled device that will be used for small-scale tests involving a small, invitation-only group of Spotify Premium users in the United States.

“Our focus remains on becoming the world’s number one audio platform—not on creating hardware,” the blog post says. The company adds that “We don’t have any current plans to make this specific device available to consumers, but the learnings from our test will dictate how we develop experiences everywhere you listen.”

However, this type of hardware for testing may be getting additional focuses from Spotify’s R&D team. The blog post notes that we could hear rumblings about a Voice Thing and Home Thing to further guide Spotify’s development of listening experiences.

Anna Washenko