• Windows
  • Media

Spotify's cache and your downloads are two different things

One comes back for free and one costs you your offline music. Where each lives on a PC and the setting that caps the first.

4 min read

Spotify stores two things and most advice conflates them. One is a cache of music you streamed, which exists so the same track does not download twice. The other is music you deliberately downloaded for offline listening.

Where they are

Get-ChildItem "$env:LOCALAPPDATA\Spotify","$env:APPDATA\Spotify" -EA SilentlyContinue |
  ForEach-Object {
    $s = (Get-ChildItem $_.FullName -Recurse -Force -File -EA SilentlyContinue | Measure-Object Length -Sum).Sum
    [PSCustomObject]@{ MB = [math]::Round($s/1MB); Path = $_.FullName }
  } | Sort-Object MB -Descending

The Storage folder under Local is the streaming cache. Offline downloads are kept separately and are the ones you would miss.

The setting worth changing once

Spotify's settings have a storage section showing the current cache size with an option to clear it, and the location can be moved to another drive. Using the app's own control is the safe route because it knows which files are cache and which are downloads.

Removing downloads

Turn the download switch off per album or playlist inside the app. Deleting the files by hand works and leaves the app believing it still has music it no longer has, which shows up as albums that will not play offline.

What you clearEffect
Cache, from settingsStreamed tracks download again as you listen
Downloads, from the appOffline listening stops until you download again
The folders, by handBoth, plus a confused app

How much this is worth

A few gigabytes at most, which puts it below the categories that actually fill a Windows drive. It is worth doing because it is one setting and it stays done. The order for the rest is here, and the folder it sits in is AppData.

Common questions

Where is the Spotify cache on Windows?

Under %LOCALAPPDATA%\Spotify, with the Storage folder holding streamed audio. Application data and offline downloads are kept separately under the Spotify folders in AppData.

Does clearing Spotify's cache delete downloads?

Not if you clear it from the app's settings, which knows the difference. Deleting the folders by hand can remove both and leave the app believing it still has offline music.

How do I stop Spotify using so much space?

Set a storage limit in the app's settings, or move the cache to another drive. A capped cache stays capped and does not affect anything you downloaded deliberately.

Why does Spotify's cache grow if I never download?

Because streamed audio is cached so the same track does not download twice. That is normal for a streaming app and what the storage setting is for.

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