Spooty: The Self-Hosted Spotify Downloader You Can Run Yourself

Ever wanted to keep a local copy of your Spotify playlists, but felt uneasy about sketchy online converters or handing your credentials to a random website? You're not alone. For developers and tinkerers who value control and privacy, the ideal solution often lives on their own hardware. Enter Spooty, a self-hosted tool that lets you download Spotify tracks directly to your machine.

It's a project that scratches a specific itch: getting your music out of the streaming walled garden, without the ads, subscriptions, or privacy concerns of third-party services. If you've ever thought about backing up your favorite mixes or creating a personal music archive, this is a project worth a look.

What It Does

Spooty is a Python-based application that acts as a bridge between Spotify and your local storage. In simple terms, you give it a Spotify playlist URL, and it fetches the audio for each track, saving it as high-quality MP3 files complete with proper metadata (like title, artist, album, and cover art). It runs on your own computer or server, meaning your Spotify credentials and the downloaded files never leave your control.

Why It's Cool

The "self-hosted" aspect is the main attraction here. Unlike web-based tools, Spooty gives you full transparency and control. You can inspect the code, see exactly how it works, and modify it to fit your needs. It's a developer's approach to a common problem.

Beyond that, it's cleverly built. It uses Spotify's official API (with your own credentials) to get track information and then sources the actual audio from YouTube Music, handling the search and download process seamlessly. This combination is a practical workaround that results in reliable, high-quality downloads. It's a neat piece of engineering that solves the problem with available tools.

How to Try It

Getting Spooty running is a straightforward process for anyone comfortable with a terminal. You'll need Python and pip installed.

1. Clone the repo:

   git clone https://github.com/Raiper34/spooty.git
   cd spooty
   

2. Install dependencies:

   pip install -r requirements.txt
   

3. Set up your Spotify API credentials. You'll need to create an app in the Spotify Developer Dashboard to get a CLIENT_ID and CLIENT_SECRET. The repo's README has detailed steps for this.

4. Run it! The basic command to download a playlist is:

   python spooty.py -p "https://open.spotify.com/playlist/your-playlist-id-here"
   

For all the configuration options and setup details, the project's GitHub repository is the best source of truth.

Final Thoughts

Spooty is a great example of a utilitarian, do-it-yourself tool that serves a clear purpose. It's not about piracy—it's about data ownership and portability for the music you already have access to. For developers, it's a useful script to archive playlists, a fun project to study, and a solid starting point if you wanted to build additional features.

It fills a niche for those of us who prefer a self-reliant tech stack. Give it a spin if you've been looking for a clean, local way to keep a backup of your soundtrack.

Follow for more interesting projects: @githubprojects