Unofficial fan-made Spicetify theme. Not affiliated with Pioneer Corporation. May break on non-English Spotify. If you enjoy PioneerVFD, a star helps more people find it.

Miss the old 2000s Pioneer head units, dolphins swimming while you bump tunes? Now your Spotify can have them.

PioneerVFD turns Spotify desktop into a 2000s Pioneer-style VFD/LCD car stereo. It replaces the stock lower player with a chrome head-unit: WebM OEL animations, RGB and mono display modes, hardware-style readouts, ATT muting, and live spectrum bars around the center badge.

v4.1.0: Adaptive Tint (the display recolors to your album art), a State Flash LCD takeover for EJECT/BAND/LYRICS/CINEMA (fullscreen mode), remapped DAB controls, persistent lyrics lamp state, a truer base cyan phosphor ramp, and LCD play/pause + low-zoom layout fixes.

Import your own clips: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QuRZPHMGhso

Got feedback or suggestions?

Open an issue, use the discussions tab, or reach out to me at:

• Discord: @dollarsign
• Reddit: u/Confident-Change-664

Preview

Default state with PULSE = ON, LCD = DSEG14

TINT = LIME, DARK = ON, PULSE = ON, SCROLL = LOOP, LCD = DSEG14

Features

• Chrome Pioneer head-unit panel replacing Spotify's lower player.
• WebM OEL center display with authentic Pioneer clips, streamed from GitHub Pages and cached in IndexedDB after first play.
• GAUGES: audio-reactive twin VFD needles, driven by PULSE. (new)
• PIONEERVFD: signature clip, the Night Cruising loop with an animated logo sting. (new)
• Metadata LCDs: artist, title, playtime, ATT, tint, dim, mode, clip, and playback.
• 15 tints: cyan, teal, lime, amber, orange, red, pink, magenta, violet, blue, green, yellow, indigo, black-on-white, white-on-black.
• PULSE live spectrum bars via Chromium desktop audio capture (Windows/macOS) or a Linux helper bridge.
• ATT instant mute/restore, LST queue, BAND archive.org radio broadcasts, fullscreen mode (click the center wordmark).
• FULL / ECO performance modes.
• Import your own .webm OEL clip (up to 25 MB).

OEL clips

The center display rotates through a set of authentic Pioneer OEL clips, including the new GAUGES and PIONEERVFD, plus an EJECTING easter egg. All load from GitHub Pages and cache in IndexedDB after a successful play. GAUGES reacts to live audio, so turn on PULSE to drive the needles.

Custom clip. CUSTOMIZE > OEL imports a local .webm (25 MB max) as an extra clip. It joins the rotation, cycles in DEMO, and persists in IndexedDB. One slot, replace or remove anytime. Convert GIFs to WebM first; hosted URLs and multiple custom clips aren't supported.

Color toggle. The racing and custom clips follow the current tint by default. CUSTOMIZE > COLOR = ON (or clicking the OEL display) keeps them full-color while the rest of the theme stays tint-aware.

Controls

MENU: OEL (cycle clip), DEMO (auto-cycle without changing the saved startup clip), PERF (FULL/ECO), PULSE (live audio), VFD (display on/off), CUSTOMIZE.

CUSTOMIZE: TINT (15-mode picker + ADAPTIVE), TYPE (Spotify content font), COLOR (tint vs full-color clips), BUTTON (LED glow: SOFT/HARD/OFF), OEL (import/replace/remove custom clip), DARK (dark chrome).

Faceplate: ATT (instant mute, restores on next press; exits when you adjust volume), DIM (LCD brightness), LST (queue), EEQ (click to tint-match), lyrics button (opens Spotify lyrics, avoids Beautiful/Spicy Lyrics takeover).

Saved across restarts: PERF, TINT, DIM, TYPE, selected clip (incl. custom), VFD, COLOR, dark chrome, EEQ tint, button glow. PULSE always boots OFF so Spotify doesn't reopen audio capture on its own.

PULSE (live audio)

• Windows / macOS: Chromium desktop capture. Press PULSE, then pick a capture source that shares audio.
• Linux: Chromium usually won't expose Spotify audio to the picker. Install PVFD-Linux-Helper, run it, then press PULSE; the menu row switches to HLPR when it's receiving helper audio.

Performance

• FULL: full display treatment.
• ECO: lower-cost. Keeps the OEL display usable while trimming surrounding glow, side-panel updates, VU behavior, and decorative app-side styling.

Requirements

• Spotify desktop + Spicetify CLI (installed and initialized)
• A Spotify/Chromium build that exposes extension APIs through Spicetify
• PULSE on Windows/macOS: Chromium desktop capture with audio sharing
• PULSE on Linux: optional PVFD-Linux-Helper plus PipeWire/PulseAudio tools (pactl/parec or pw-record)

Install

Marketplace

Install PioneerVFD from the Spicetify Marketplace. It fetches the versioned CSS/JS published in this repo, pulls clips from GitHub Pages, and caches them in IndexedDB. Linux users who want PULSE also need the helper (below).

If the OEL screen is blank or the extension APIs aren't exposed, use a script install instead; they set the correct Spicetify config and preserve your existing extensions.

Windows

Download and extract the latest release ZIP. Open PowerShell inside the PioneerVFD folder (you should see install-windows.ps1, Themes, Extensions):

powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .\install-windows.ps1

Linux

Extract the ZIP, open Terminal in the PioneerVFD folder (install-linux.sh, Themes, Extensions):

chmod +x ./install-linux.sh
./install-linux.sh

macOS

Extract the ZIP, open Terminal in the PioneerVFD folder (install-macos.sh, Themes, Extensions):

chmod +x ./install-macos.sh
./install-macos.sh

The macOS installer enables Spicetify DevTools by default (some Mac installs need it to load APIs/extensions). Skip it with PVFD_ENABLE_DEVTOOLS=0 ./install-macos.sh.

Linux PULSE helper

pipx install git+https://github.com/adainstarks/PVFD-Linux-Helper.git
pvfd-hlpr --with-spotify

--with-spotify starts the helper alongside Spotify. Or run pvfd-hlpr in a terminal and leave it open. Debug detection with pvfd-hlpr --probe.

What the installers do

Locate the Spicetify config root, copy the theme and extension, configure current_theme/color_scheme PioneerVFD with CSS/JS injection, color replacement, asset overwrite, and expose_apis 1, preserve existing enabled extensions, then run spicetify apply.

Remove

spicetify config extensions pioneerVFD.js-
spicetify config current_theme ""
spicetify apply

On Windows, run the same commands from PowerShell.

Troubleshooting

• PULSE silent (Windows/macOS): toggle it off/on, then pick a capture source that includes audio.

• PULSE silent (Linux): run pvfd-hlpr, confirm the menu row reads HLPR; use pvfd-hlpr --probe to debug sink/source detection.

• Blank OEL screen: rerun the platform installer and open Spotify once while online.

• macOS black screen / no JavaScript: fully quit Spotify, then:

  spicetify backup
  spicetify config expose_apis 1 inject_css 1 inject_theme_js 1 replace_colors 1 overwrite_assets 1
  spicetify enable-devtools
  spicetify apply

  If enable-devtools is unavailable: spicetify config always_enable_devtools 1 && spicetify apply.

• Manual raw-copy installs aren't recommended; the theme depends on several Spicetify config flags and exposed APIs.

Special thanks

Anyone who opens an issue or PR with a meaningful improvement.

• @syzyxy

Disclaimer

Unofficial, fan-made Spicetify theme inspired by early-2000s car-stereo VFD/LCD interfaces. Not affiliated with, endorsed by, or associated with Pioneer Corporation or Spotify. Pioneer and the Pioneer logo are trademarks of Pioneer Corporation; Spotify is a trademark of Spotify AB. All trademarks belong to their respective owners. Free and open source under the MIT License. Optional donations support development and grant no licensing, support, or affiliation.

License

MIT, see LICENSE.