Like a DJ in your pocket, Splyce is a beautiful music player that lets you select songs and order the playlist before mixing the beats, displaying visual effects, creating a light show and more. All it takes is just some basic instruction from you, and Splyce will get the party started.
Use the app as an everyday music player, at get-togethers with friends, or while you’re at the gym. The app displays the beats per minute for every song, so you can take that into consideration when crafting your playlist. Hit the jump and I’ll show you how it works.
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Push Play
The best way to explore all that Splyce can offer is to just dive in, so the first thing the app will invite you to do is build a playlist. All the music available on your iPhone will be displayed alphabetically according to the song title. If this is your first time using Splyce, the app will take some time to analyze each song and determine its beats per minute (BPM). Following that, the BPM will always be displayed next to the song title.
Splyce displays a pleasant-looking wallpaper on your iPhone when in use.
Tap all the songs you want to add to your playlist, then click Done and your playlist will be displayed. If you want to remove a song, just swipe it to the left to delete it from the list. Alternatively, swiping any song to the right will auto-order it in the playlist. According to Splyce, songs are auto-ordered according to ascending BPM.
You can also tap and hold any song to drag it wherever you want in the playlist. All these options for ordering the songs make it really easy to customize your listening experience. Tap any song to start the music, which is accompanied by a captivating visual.
The BPM for each song is displayed to the right of the track name. Find songs by name, artist or album.
If you want to add more songs to your playlist at any time, just tap the plus sign in the top left corner. Another option is to select “I want it all” at the top, which will use the entire library of music on your iPhone as your playlist. By tapping the plus sign, you’ll be able to view all your music, including Playlists. Use the tabs at the bottom to view your music categorized by artists, songs or albums.
Now Turn It Up
As your music plays, there are a lot of options at your fingertips. Tap the Splyce logo located front and center at the top of your screen to reveal a pulldown menu. Here you’ll find Mix Mode, Duration, Mix Time, Order, Color and Lighting.
Changing the Mix Mode will affect how all the songs behave, more or less.
- It’s every man for himself — Every song has its own BPM and will keep it no matter how fast or slow the songs on either side of it are
- Follow the leader — The first song’s BPM sets the beat for the rest of the playlist and following songs will try to adapt their BPM within a defined range
- I’ll follow you — Every song tries to adapt to the next one within a defined BPM range over the mix period of time
A visual accompanies each song. The pulldown menu reveals all your mixing options and then some.
Do you ever find yourself bored with a song long before it’s close to ending? With the Duration setting you can change how many seconds of every song are played — 60 seconds, 120 seconds and so on. Or you can keep the setting at All, which will use the entire track for every song.
The Mix Time you set determines how many crossover seconds, in other words, how many seconds both songs will be playing simultaneously. Set this for 10 seconds, 20 seconds, 30 seconds and so on, and Splyce will overlap the tracks accordingly.
The names of both tracks will be displayed during the mix time. Under Settings you can activate “shake to shuffle.”
If you want your playlist to build in intensity, you can tap Order to automatically order all the songs in ascending BPM. This is an easier alternative to swiping multiple or even all of the songs to the right in the playlist.
Tap Color to change Splyce’s background hue. And finally, Lighting lets you add some light effects to your playlist. The app will use the flash feature on your phone to emit bursts in the manner of a mini light show. The screen will also flash simultaneously. (Splyce warns that using the light effects can decrease battery life at a faster rate than normal.)
Splyce allows you options for controlling the light effects.
Tap the Settings wheel in the top right corner to reveal even more options. Here you can turn on or off features like “shake to shuffle,” “drop played songs” and “loop.” Miscellaneous controls you can also switch on or off include “use native picker,” “hide iCloud items” and “analyze songs when idle.” Select Visual Beat to change settings regarding the light effects.
Extra Tips
Splyce has good support for different audio file types, including MP3, M4A, AAC, WAV, AIF and others. If you want to play a song or playlist stored in iCloud, you’ll have to download it first to your iPhone, of course.
This app is just so darn pretty to look at, which only enhances the listening experience. In addition to that, the controls are a snap to learn, and mixing features are something like magic. This is now my go-to app when I go running, since it takes me just a few seconds to build a high-intensity playlist. And with the Mix Modes and Mix Times, the energy of the playlist stays strong — there’s no weak downtime in between songs.
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