On Wednesday, popular music streaming service Spotify announced that 'Spotify Free' users will have free access to offline music on their tablets and mobile devices. This comes after years of Spotify asking users to sign up for a 'Spotify Premium' subscription to be able to listen to music offline, a service which cost subscribers $9.99 plus any tax and is restricted to people with a credit/debit cards or – available in some countries – if you have a PayPal account.

The move comes as happy news for owners of Android, Apple, and Windows smartphones and tablets, who unless they shelled out for the paid subscription found limited use for the Spotify Free app on mobile devices, platforms where offline music capability is pretty much a necessity.

Spotify has chiseled out a sizeable market share in streaming audio since its initial launch in Sweden in 2008, and its following launch in the U.S., 2011. While paying Spotify Premium subscribers enjoy uninterrupted music both online and offline, Spotify Free users have had to put up with regular advertising and a number of other limitations.

One limitation of Spotify Free has been that its users are unable to play music offline, whether on a computer, or on mobile devices. The company's announcement today is set to enable this much missed feature.

As of today, free users will be able to sync unlimited music to their mobile devices for enjoyment offline, with only one caveat, they cannot skip tracks or rewind more than 10 times, and they are required to listen to any album or playlist in so called 'shuffle mode'. This means Spotify free users are unable to pick a specific track while listening offline, and will have to leave it to a random generator.

While this is still limited compared to what premium subscribers enjoys, Spotify says it is perfect when going for a jog or to the gym, or for just sitting back and letting the streaming service help you discover new tracks from your favorite artists.

Spotify is currently supported on most major platforms, including Microsoft Windows, OS X, Linux, Android, iOS, Windows Phone, as well as streaming from a web browser.