“Export” and “transfer” sound like the same request, but they’re not quite the same job. A direct transfer moves a playlist from one app to another in one click and you never see the data in between. An export gives you the playlist as an actual file — a spreadsheet of tracks, artists, and albums — that exists independently of either service. That file is useful in its own right: a backup that survives either app changing or shutting down, something you can review and edit before committing to an import, or just a record of a playlist exactly as it stood on a given day.
This guide covers that file-based route specifically — how to get your Spotify playlist out as a CSV, what to do with it, and how to get those tracks into Apple Music afterward — plus the quick direct-transfer option for when you don’t need the file at all.
Why export to a file instead of transferring directly
A few real reasons people want the file step rather than a one-click transfer:
A backup that isn’t tied to either app. If you export to CSV, you have a plain, permanent record of exactly what was in that playlist — track names, artists, albums, sometimes release dates and Spotify IDs — sitting in a spreadsheet on your computer. No app, subscription, or account required to read it ever again.
Review before you commit. A direct transfer happens automatically, and you find out afterward what matched wrong. Exporting first lets you look through the list, catch anything you’d want to fix or drop, and clean it up before it ever touches Apple Music.
Archiving or sharing the list itself. Sometimes you want the list, not necessarily the playlist functionality — to email someone, to keep in a notes app, to cross-reference against another collection you’re building.
Feeding it into another tool. Some more advanced workflows use the exported file as an input for a different transfer or matching tool, rather than relying on one service’s built-in matching.
If none of that applies and you just want the playlist working in Apple Music as fast as possible, the direct in-app transfer covered near the end of this guide is genuinely faster — this file method is for when the file itself has value to you.
Step 1: Export your Spotify playlist as a CSV
Spotify’s own app doesn’t have a built-in “export to file” button, so this step uses a dedicated export tool. Exportify is the best-known option for this — a free, browser-based tool built specifically to turn a Spotify playlist into a downloadable CSV.
- Go to the Exportify site and sign in with your Spotify account (it needs read access to see your playlists — it doesn’t need or ask for any ability to modify your Spotify account).
- You’ll see a list of your playlists, including Liked Songs, which conveniently does show up here even though it isn’t a normal playlist inside Spotify itself.
- Click Export next to the playlist you want. A CSV file downloads to your computer.
- Open it in any spreadsheet program (Excel, Google Sheets, Numbers, or a plain text editor) to see the contents: track name, artist, album, and additional metadata depending on the tool’s current fields.
That CSV is now a standalone file. It doesn’t need Spotify, doesn’t need an internet connection to view, and will still open in ten years the same way any spreadsheet does.
What the file is actually good for at this point
Before moving on to Apple Music, take a moment with the file itself if backup was your goal. Save a copy somewhere durable — cloud storage plus a local copy is a sensible minimum. Rename it clearly with the playlist name and date. If you maintain several playlists you care about, doing this export periodically gives you a running archive of your music taste that exists completely independent of any streaming company’s decisions.
Step 2: Get the tracks into Apple Music
The CSV itself won’t import into Apple Music with a single click — Apple doesn’t read Spotify’s export format directly. From here you have two realistic paths, and which one makes sense depends on the playlist’s size.
For a short playlist: add tracks manually using the file as your checklist
If the playlist is modest in size — a few dozen songs — the CSV becomes a simple, reliable checklist. Open Apple Music, create a new playlist, and search for each track from your spreadsheet by name and artist, adding matches one by one. It’s manual, but it’s also the most accurate method there is, since you’re personally confirming every match rather than trusting automated matching. For a playlist that really matters — a wedding playlist, something with sentimental weight — this slow, deliberate approach is often worth the extra time.
For a longer playlist: use the direct transfer, then cross-check against your file
For anything longer, running Apple’s built-in transfer tool and then using your exported CSV as an audit checklist is the practical middle ground. Here’s how:
- In the Apple Music app (or music.apple.com in a browser — this feature lives on the web player and mobile app, not the installed Mac or Windows desktop app), go to your profile and select Transfer Music from Other Music Services.
- Authorize Spotify and select the same playlist you exported.
- Let it transfer automatically.
- Open your CSV alongside the new Apple Music playlist and compare them side by side. Because you have the original list in front of you as plain text, spotting a missing or wrong track is much faster than trying to remember what should be there from memory.
This combination — automated transfer plus a manual file-based audit — catches the mismatches that a transfer alone would leave you unaware of. Expect roughly a 90-95% match rate on the automated portion; your CSV is what lets you find and fix the other 5-10% with confidence rather than guesswork.
Handling the tracks your export reveals as missing
Once your CSV comparison turns up gaps, a few common causes and fixes:
Regional licensing differences. A track available on Spotify in your region isn’t guaranteed to be in Apple’s catalog for the same region, and vice versa. Search Apple Music directly — sometimes the song exists under slightly different metadata (a featured-artist credit written differently, for instance) than what the export shows.
Independent or very niche releases. Small-label or unsigned releases are more likely to be on one platform and not the other. If it’s genuinely absent from Apple’s catalog, there’s no transfer trick that fixes it.
Live versions or alternate mixes swapped in. The automated transfer sometimes grabs the closest-titled match rather than the exact one. Your CSV shows you what the original actually was, letting you search for and replace the correct version.
The Liked Songs quirk, solved by this method
Here’s a place where the export-first approach genuinely helps. Spotify’s Liked Songs isn’t a real playlist — it’s a library flag — which normally means transfer tools can’t move it as a unit. But Exportify treats it like any other list and exports it to CSV without any special handling needed on your part. That gives you a clean, complete record of every liked track, which you can then work through using either method above. If Liked Songs is what you’re trying to preserve, exporting it first is arguably the most reliable way to make sure nothing gets left behind.
Making the playlist permanent, not just present
Worth a final thought once everything’s imported and verified. The songs now sitting in your Apple Music playlist are, structurally, no different from any other Apple Music catalog track — streaming, DRM-protected, and dependent on your subscription staying active. Your CSV survives forever as a plain file; the playable version of the playlist inside Apple Music does not have that same independence.
If this is a playlist worth protecting fully — not just moved, but genuinely permanent — the extra step is converting the actual audio to standalone MP3 files you own. An Apl Music Downloader saves Apple Music songs as MP3 with clear audio and no subscription, which pairs naturally with this whole export mindset: you’d already have the CSV as your data backup, and MP3 files give you the audio backup to match. The reasoning behind doing this is covered in this look at the benefits of converting Apple Music to MP3, and for the Spotify side specifically, SpotiDown does the equivalent job before you even move to Apple Music. Aim for 320 kbps if quality matters to you, since it’s MP3’s ceiling.
A note on doing this responsibly
Converting music for your own personal, offline use generally sits in a different category from sharing or redistributing it, and each platform’s terms of service set their own rules separate from copyright law. Keep any conversions for your own listening, never sell or share them, and follow the rules where you live.
Common Questions asked by users
How do I export a Spotify playlist as a file? Use a browser-based tool like Exportify, sign in with Spotify, and click Export next to the playlist. It downloads as a CSV you can open in any spreadsheet program.
Can I export Spotify’s Liked Songs specifically? Yes — Exportify treats Liked Songs as an exportable list even though it isn’t a real playlist inside Spotify itself, so it’s actually the easiest way to get a clean record of everything you’ve liked.
Does the exported CSV import directly into Apple Music? No, Apple Music doesn’t read that file format directly. Use it as a manual checklist for a small playlist, or as an audit tool to verify a playlist moved with Apple’s automated transfer feature.
Why bother exporting to a file instead of just transferring directly? A file gives you a permanent backup independent of either app, lets you review before committing to an import, and makes it easy to catch mismatches by comparing the original list against what actually transferred.
Do exported playlists stay updated if I add songs on Spotify later? No, a CSV export is a snapshot of the playlist at that moment. For ongoing sync between services, a dedicated transfer tool with a paid sync feature is the better fit, not the file export method.
The bottom line
Exporting a Spotify playlist means something specific: getting it as an actual file, not just moving it from one app to another. Doing that with a tool like Exportify gives you a permanent CSV backup, a manual checklist for smaller playlists, and — combined with Apple’s own automated transfer — a reliable way to audit a larger playlist for anything that matched incorrectly.
It’s a bit more work than a single-click transfer, and for a playlist you don’t especially care about, that extra step probably isn’t worth it. But for the playlists that matter — the ones with sentimental weight or genuine irreplaceability — having both a data backup (the CSV) and, if you go a step further, an audio backup (converted MP3 files) means that playlist survives no matter what either streaming service decides to do next.
