Ask your history in Claude or ChatGPT

Step zero: get your full history

Neither assistant can see your Spotify listening on its own. The data that answers interesting questions is your Extended Streaming History: every play since you joined, with timestamps, skips, shuffle and device. Request it from Spotify’s privacy page (pick “Extended streaming history”, not “Account data”) and confirm the email. Our export guide covers every click.

It usually arrives within a few days. When the zip arrives, you have two ways to bring it to an assistant.

Option 1: upload the files to a chat

1. Unzip the export and open the Spotify Extended Streaming History folder. The files you want are named Streaming_History_Audio_….json.
2. Pick the years you care about. A decade of listening can be over 200 MB of JSON, more than a single chat will take, so start with a few files.
3. Use a chat that can run code: data analysis in ChatGPT, or Claude with its code tool turned on. Without code, the model reads a sample of the text and estimates, and counts come out wrong.
4. Attach the files and paste a prompt that sets the rules.

A starter prompt

Most wrong answers come from the data’s quirks, not the model. Spell them out (and swap in your own time zone):

These are my Spotify Extended Streaming History files. Load all of them
into one table with Python. Each record is one play:

- ts is when the play ended, in UTC. Convert it to Europe/Berlin before
  answering anything about dates or time of day.
- ms_played is how long it played. Only count plays of 30 seconds or more.
- A song is master_metadata_track_name + master_metadata_album_artist_name.
  Group by those, not by spotify_track_uri.
- Drop rows where spotify_track_uri is empty (podcasts and audiobooks).

First tell me how many plays you loaded and the date range. Then answer:
Who was my most-played artist each year?

Where it breaks

• Every chat starts from zero. Uploads don’t carry over, so you re-attach the files and re-paste the rules each time.
• Big exports don’t fit. You end up analyzing a few years at a time and stitching answers together.
• Answers drift. The assistant writes new code on every run. Ask it to show the count and the code, and expect small differences between chats.
• The whole log goes along. Every play, with time, place and the IP address Spotify recorded, sits with the AI provider under its own data settings.

Option 2: connect your history

Claude and ChatGPT both support connectors: outside tools the assistant can call mid-conversation, built on the Model Context Protocol (MCP). With a connector, your history stays in a database and the assistant asks it questions, instead of reading a file.

ListenLens works this way. You import your zip once on ListenLens. The connector tells the assistant how your data is laid out and the rules above (time zone, what counts as a play, how songs group), so you don’t have to. The assistant writes the query, ListenLens runs it against your database, and only the result rows go back. A new chat picks up where the data is, with no re-uploading, and your whole history is there, not just the files that fit.

Setting it up

1. Import your Spotify zip on ListenLens.
2. Open Your AI in the app and copy the server URL.
3. Add it as a custom connector in Claude’s or ChatGPT’s settings. Custom connectors depend on your plan in each app, and ChatGPT may ask you to turn on developer mode.
4. Sign in to ListenLens when asked and approve read access to your listening history.

You can disconnect an assistant from the same Your AI page at any time.

Upload or connect?

Prompts to try

Either way, the best questions are the ones a recap can’t answer. Start with these:

• What was my most-played artist each year? Show it as a bump chart.
• Which songs did I play on repeat for a month and then never again?
• What do I play after midnight that I never play at noon?
• Has my skip rate changed over the years? Split it by shuffle on and off.
• List the songs I loved in 2016 and haven’t played since.
• Write a short story of my decade in music, with real numbers.

More ideas in questions worth asking your history.

Questions