Meanings
- uncountableMusic designed to influence mood, behavior, or cognitive state.
1 more example
By championing the lean-back listener, Spotify helped popularize a resurgence of interest in “functional music”, the industry's current preferred way to describe music for sleeping, studying, chilling, focusing, etcetera. Today, functional music is a defining phenomenon of the streaming era, especially mood music for wellness and productivity, which self-improvement culture increasingly renders the same.
2025, Liz Pelly, Mood Machine: The Rise of Spotify and the Costs of the Perfect Playlist, 1st edition, New York: Atria Books, →ISBN
Cite this entry
functional music. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/functional%20music
“functional music.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/functional%20music. Accessed November 4, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “functional music,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/functional%20music.
Source: functional music on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.