Spotify is introducing an “AI Persona” badge to identify artist profiles that represent AI-generated identities, as the streaming platform expands its efforts to give listeners greater transparency over who is behind the music they discover.
Starting in mid-September, the badge will appear on selected artist profiles, in search results and alongside tracks in playlists. It will signal that the identity presented by an artist may have been generated using artificial intelligence and does not represent a real person.
Spotify will also exclude artists labelled as AI Personas from its editorial and algorithmic recommendations by default. Their music will therefore not ordinarily appear through personalised recommendations, although listeners who actively follow AI Personas may still encounter their content.
The company is not banning AI-generated identities or their music from the platform.
Artists can begin voluntarily identifying their profiles as AI Personas through Spotify for Artists. However, Spotify said it will not depend entirely on self-disclosure and will conduct its own reviews of profiles whose names and imagery appear to represent photorealistic AI-generated identities.
The initial review process will focus on artists that meet defined audience thresholds. Spotify said this approach should allow the labels to cover the majority of artist profiles visited by listeners.
When Spotify applies the badge following its own review, the affected artist will be notified and given an opportunity to either self-disclose as an AI Persona or appeal the decision. Spotify also plans to introduce a feature allowing listeners to report profiles they believe represent AI-generated personas in the coming months.
The company stressed that the badge applies specifically to an artist’s public identity and not to the process used to create the music.
That distinction reflects the range of ways AI is currently being used by musicians. A human artist, for example, could use generative AI during production without becoming an AI Persona. Conversely, an artist profile presenting a synthetic person could receive the badge regardless of the precise technology used to produce individual tracks.
Spotify is addressing music creation separately through AI Credits, which allow artists to disclose how artificial intelligence was involved in their creative process. The company said tens of thousands of AI credits are being submitted daily.
The latest policy follows growing scrutiny of synthetic artists on streaming platforms and questions around whether listeners can reliably distinguish between human performers and AI-generated identities.
Spotify said listener feedback showed users did not like encountering profiles that appeared to represent real people only to later discover that their identities were AI-generated.
The AI Persona badge forms part of a wider set of identity and transparency measures introduced by Spotify in 2026.
These include Verified by Spotify, which identifies artists confirmed as real people, as well as SongDNA, Artist Details and Artist Profile Protection. Spotify said hundreds of thousands of profiles have already been verified, representing more than 99% of artists that listeners actively search for on the platform.
The company is also adjusting its recommendation systems to prioritise what it describes as authentic human artists while attempting to prevent spam and low-effort content from being recommended.
The move creates a clearer separation between allowing AI-related content on Spotify and actively promoting it through the platform’s discovery systems.
As generative AI makes synthetic music and identities easier to produce at scale, Spotify’s latest changes indicate that disclosure and recommendation policies are becoming increasingly important tools for managing how AI-created personas participate in the streaming ecosystem.