Spotify, it’s fair That is to say, it has made some strange decisions in the user experience.

There are multiple panels in the app and the layout is confusing. The service constantly tracks your activity. The app also seems to have a strange hostility towards playing actual albums. All of this works to create an overall feeling that Spotify’s designers are trying to force you to use the service in a particular way.

It’s understandable, then, that some people are upset with the way music videos have been added to the platform. For the most part, they would start playing by default, in the background, whenever an artist uploaded a video for the song. Some music videos have very different audio than the original tracks, especially if they include sketches or sound effects, which can be distracting if you prefer the album version of the song. And even if you enjoy music videos (which I do), the decision to play videos by default (consuming bandwidth and battery power) bothered a lot of people.

There are some other quirks. In the Spotify desktop app, videos are barely visible; they remain contained in the small album art panel until you manage to find the hidden and extremely small Now Playing button that expands them. Additionally, the selection of videos on the platform, and those that are mysteriously absent, seems totally random. Because of this, I check YouTube first when I really want to watch a music video.

Most annoying, however, was the lack of an obvious way to disable all videos. That changed recently: There’s now an option in settings to completely disable music videos on Spotify, along with controls that disable the Canvas feature (animated album art) and video podcasts.

On mobile devices, you can do this by tapping your user profile icon in the top left to open the side panel. Then tap Settings and privacyfollowed by Content and display.

Photography: Justin Pot

In it Videos and canvases In the section you will see three options: one for music videos, one for Canvas, and one for all other videos. This last option disables video podcasts, meaning you’ll get the audio-only version of podcasts instead. Turn all this off and Spotify will use much less bandwidth.

On the desktop app, it’s a little different. Click your user profile icon in the top right corner, then click Settings. Scroll down to the Videos and canvases section to find the options to disable music videos and Canvas.

I tried this and it worked. The music videos icon on playlists and albums is gone, as is the music video collection on Artist pages. The only remaining feature disabled is the Switch to Video button in the Now Playing sidebar, which appears below the album art. Click on it and you will be prompted that the video cannot be played unless you turn videos back on in the settings. It’s strange, sure, but for the most part turning this off means you won’t have to think about music videos on Spotify anymore.

I sincerely wish Spotify released music videos more carefully. Sometimes I really want to watch a video, but not every time I play a track. Music video playlists may be welcome if run separately from audio-only playlists. I just don’t want to watch a music video when looking for the album version of a song, and I don’t think I’m alone in that. I can only hope that Spotify’s future interface design choices keep things more clearly separated.