Stockholm, Sweden - Spotify is revamping its app with a new kind of feed designed to let people listen to and discover music as if they were scrolling through TikTok or Instagram.

The app's redesigned Home feed will let you scroll vertically through an algorithmic list of various kinds of content – new releases, artist videos, audiobooks, podcast excerpts, and other kinds of video and audio.

In what founder and chief executive Daniel Ek said was the "biggest change since going mobile," the music streaming market leader is making a major break from its previous focus on showing lists of songs in playlists, albums and music libraries.

Spotify, like many other tech companies, is responding to the rise of TikTok, where younger people in particular have been discovering new music with a newer user experience of swiping upwards to show a new tile of content.

The update, which began rolling out on Thursday, changes little about the app at first sight, but it's noticeable that separate feeds for music and podcasts have been hidden behind buttons at the top of the screen.

Once inside these areas, preview clips start playing automatically, but not really in the highly addictive way the TikTok does.

"Our goal is not to steal time," product head Gustav Söderström said in a clear dig at TikTok. Instead, Spotify's goal, he said, is to help people find content to listen to later.

The update comes just days after Spotify responded to hype surrounding AI-generated content with an AI-based DJ, which plays tracks and talks over them in an artificially created voice.

The Sweden-based company is the number one in music streaming with a total of 489 million users at last count. Of these, 205 million are paying subscription customers.

Ek has also invested a lot of money in podcasts in recent years in an effort to expand advertising revenue. Podcasts also took up a lot of space in the latest Spotify event in Los Angeles.

Among other things, it's clear that there's a focus on video podcasts. Meanwhile, podcast authors will also get access to better tools to evaluate usage data.

Another new function for discovering fresh music is smart shuffle: Spotify adds more songs to users' existing playlists that the software thinks will go with them.

For playlists with more than 15 tracks, one additional song is to be added for every three. Users can either keep the recommended songs or throw them out of the list.