New SoundCloud design goes live for all users with a plethora of new features

SoundCloud, the popular cloud-based audio distribution platform, has been beta testing a new design of its service over the past several months and is rolling out these changes to everyone, as of today.

CEO Alexander Ljung announced the official launch at the Le Web conference in Paris this morning. The new design is cleaner, more polished, and much more intuitive than the interface it is replacing. There is a greater focus on content discovery and social sharing, thanks to a plethora of new social features designed to make SoundCloud more of a destination on the web, rather than just a dashboard from which to manage your own content and the content of the users you follow.

For users that haven’t been exposed to the beta version of SoundCloud on the web, which debuted in May this year (aka ‘The Next SoundCloud’), the new design and user experience now complements that of the mobile app design, which until today, looked entirely different to the design of the main web client.

SoundCloud founder and CTO Eric Wahlforss said: “Everything’s new: much more than an aesthetic redesign, the latest SoundCloud is a state-of-the-art, re-engineered platform that feels so different from before and offers an even better music and audio experience,”

Reposting is one of the flagship features in the new design, allowing you to post another user’s content into your own stream, increasing the potential for discovery by other SoundCloud users. Similar to a ‘retweet’, where you share another user’s Twitter post in your own feed.

Sets is another notable new feature, allowing you to create playlists of any public SoundCloud tracks, which you can then manage within your account and even share with other users across SoundCloud itself, as well as Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and Pinterest. You can also embed sets into web pages just like you are traditionally able to do with individual SoundCloud tracks.

There are plenty more features for you to explore for yourself, so go check out the new SoundCloud today. It should be live for everyone to use as of right now. If not, it will no doubt roll out over the next few hours so be patient.

As far as the mobile apps are concerned, there are some scheduled updates coming to the Android and iOS mobiles apps on 6 December, bringing some new user experience tweaks, ‘repost’ functionality and updates to the mobile search experience.

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• http://twitter.com/ghostdrops hngg

  I’ve paid for Lite Premium for several years now, pretty much just for the Spotlight tab. I feel as though they’ve kind of forgotten about it, as all it does is make the songs sit on top of the list, not distinguishing them at all. Irritating.

• thirdcat

  Yes, I feel the same way

• JS

  Sets is NOT a new feature, Alex Masters do you actually write this stuff or simply rehas their press release

• Chunk

  Looks like the beginning of the end for Soundcloud ….. simplicity was it’s strength originally ….. a forum where brilliant amateur musicians could share content and browse ….. now it is gradually becoming a pain in the a— , like My Space ….. where you are bombarded with content on your Dashboard that you can’t delete at will. Professional artists and their 1,000,000,000’s of computer generated brainless ‘followers’/promoters dominate the site and flood the Hot Lists with their artificially hyped, very mediocre content. Soundcloud has some of the best new music around ….. but you have to wade thru so much shite to find those pearls ….. it’s becoming increasingly exhausting. Get rid of the professional hype merchants and maybe the cream will rise to the top …. not the froth.

• sonicboomboy909

  There is now a growing backlash from long time Soundcloud users who want the old interface back, and are claiming Soundcloud is leaving them behind to concentrate on the new and commercial tablet/mobile market etc .. I haven’t seen a positive comment yet: http://blog.soundcloud.com/2012/12/04/next-becomes-soundcloud/ From what I’m seeing; parts of SC are becoming like Tahrir Square…

• Chunk

  Just been on my new Soundcloud layout page – and found top left corner an option to switch back to Soundcloud Original …… very easy and a world better ….less squinting and old options back in place ….. perfect …… If we all switch back ….. maybe the Powers that Be will realise tampering with a tried and tested Classic is My Space ‘Suicide’ Yet another arrogant bunch of people in the company who have elbowed their way into a position of influence and are trying to implement change to justify their existence by implementing a new ‘initiative’ without first consulting the long term, die-hard backbone of Soundcloud as to what changes they actually want -if any. Happens in a lot of businesses all over the world -all the time (eg. My Space)- Ho Hum …. Rookie mistake.

• Norm

  I am so angry with SoundCloud. Ever since they launched their new wotsit, I’ve not been able to log in to the site. I’m a paying subscriber but can’t access my own material. Has anyone else suffered? Soundcloud are irritatingly slow in replying to customer service emails. And has anyone noticed any increase of malicious spam mails suffixed by ‘de’ since signing up? I totally agree with Chunk and sonicboomboy909.

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