Wordle spin-off game Heardle set to shut down, Spotify announces
The announcement comes less than a year since Spotify acquired the app
Heardle, the spin-off app based on The New York Times’ Wordle game, is due to shut down less than 10 months after it was acquired by Spotify.
The game asks music lovers to guess a song each day and identify them quickly in return for points, much like the popular word game Wordle which was made popular by The New York Times in 2021.
Heardle was obtained by Spotify in July 2022, who announced the app's closure on May 5. Users reported messages from Spotify earlier last week claiming that the app “has to say goodbye”.
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“Heardle has proven to be a really fun way to connect millions of fans with songs they know and love and with new songs,” explained Spotify’s Jeremy Erlich in 2022.
Described as “a way to compete with friends as to who has the best musical knowledge”, Heardle was the first game to be acquired by Spotify in an effort to make the app more interactive and pull in a wider audience.
“After careful consideration, we have made the difficult decision to say goodbye to Heardle as we focus our efforts on other features for music discovery,” a Spotify spokesperson announced on Friday, April 14, per Billboard.
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The app will “no longer be available” from May 5, the statement reads, which also thanked fans for playing the much loved game.
Last week, Spotify also announced the closure of Spotify Live which was purchased by the streaming service in 2021, originally under the name Spotify Greenroom. The service allowed users to use live audio and podcast features in-app.
“After a period of experimentation and learnings around how Spotify users interact with live audio, we’ve made the decision to sunset the Spotify Live app,” Spotify told Music Ally.
Gemma Ross is Mixmag's Assistant Editor, follow her on Twitter