Spotify Continues To Grow Faster Than Apple Music Thanks To Free Tier

Joe Rossignol reports via Mac Rumors: Spotify today announced it now has over 140 million subscribers worldwide, including users that only listen to the free ad-supported tier. Spotify last said it had over 100 million subscribers in June 2016, so it has gained around 40 million listeners in one year to remain the world's largest streaming music service. Spotify didn't update its number of paying subscribers, which stood at over 50 million worldwide as of March 2017. By comparison, Apple at its Worldwide Developers Conference last week announced that Apple Music now has 27 million paying subscribers, just weeks before the streaming music service turns two years old. Apple Music doesn't have a free tier, and Apple doesn't regularly disclose how many users are using the free trial.

Free is the reason I still use it

[Anonymous Coward]

I really don't feel the need to pay for another subscription service, so I use the free option.

If they didn't offer it, I wouldn't pay for it either, so they might as well make some money from ads.

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[quenda]

Why free when they keep doing "3 months premium for 99c" promos for "new" users?

I have not watched adverts since the VCR was invented. If all the ad-free radio services were to shut down, I'd have to dust off the 20GB mp3 collection.

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[KozmoStevnNaut]

Seriously man, it's less than $10/month. I used to spend twice that per week, on music.

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[KozmoStevnNaut]

Sure, but there are only a handful of albums I would buy and cherish and listen to forever. Having a Spotify subscription does not prevent me from also buying select albums.

However, it does allow me to listen to new albums in great quality (no more shitty Youtube videos) without having to buy them first. This gives me a better basis for determining whether I actually want to buy it. And if (which is a very big "if") I decide to cancel my subscription, I'll still have all of that music, the music that matter

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[qbast]

And what do you have to show for it ? 20 year old car? Music albums you got bored of decade ago?

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[KozmoStevnNaut]

Everything I have, I own outright. The only exception is my apartment, but only because I couldn't afford to buy it outright, otherwise I would have.

I see a Spotify subscription as a membership of a vast library of music, bigger than any person could ever amass in a lifetime. Obviously, I have some favorite albums (and I own a lot of them on CD or LP, or as purchased downloads from Bandcamp), but that doesn't ever begin to cover all the music I listen to. Say I feel in the mood for some German rap music or

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[fj3k]

Technically they're paying by listening to advertising.

Apple music did something clever

[rsilvergun]

if you're in college you get it for $5/mo. See, it's not just about growth, it's about the right kind of growth. The kind of people you can raise their rates on and they won't care because they still have jobs.

Sure, we're losing money on each free user...

[Theaetetus]

... but we'll make it up in volume!

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

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[tepples]

For the first two years that the iPhone and iPod touch were available, iTunes was the only music player that could run in the background. Because iPhone OS 1 lacked an App Store, only Safari could play music, and it would pause playback when the user switched away. Though iPhone OS 2 introduced the App Store, it also paused non-Apple apps when the user switched away. Only in iPhone OS 3 did Apple introduce multitasking for third-party apps, but by then, millions of users were already locked into what would

It's got to get smarter

[in10se]

I've tried Spotify (free version) numerous times since it launched. I've listened to and rated hundreds of songs, but the music suggestion algorithm on Spotify radio just sucks. I'm constantly skipping tracks because they play music I don't like.

I like Pandora, but their selection of music is so small. They tend to play music I like, but quite often it's a lot of remixes of songs I previously rated up.

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[moeinvt]

Does the free version generate a "Discover Weekly" playlist for you? If so, check out those songs, or next time they offer 3 months of premium for free, try it out and see what they pick.
Every Monday you get a list of 30 songs that they've generated based on what you've been listening to. I am freakin' amazed at how well it has been picking songs for me. Acts I've never heard of. The only downer is that I'm finding all these good bands that have come and gone so there's no chance of ever seeing them on

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[robkeeney]

I use the free tier. It generates Discover Weekly and Release Radar. It also give 6 daily mixes, generated from selections from several of my playlists. I've found plenty of great songs via Spotify, maybe more than I ever found in all my years of using Pandora.

My only complaint with Spotify's free tier is that most of the commercials they play are trying to get you to subscribe! I'd really rather they just play commercials for stuff I might actually want to buy.

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[rot16]

Discover weekly has served me well. I used to listen to the whole playlist a few times and then added the best songs to my songs library. Top result so far has been that I liked 28 of 30 songs. That's rather impressive.

It's about the platform support and openess too

[Keruo]

You can get Spotify playing on a toaster running NetBSD. Apple Play? Not so much.. you're stuck with what they let you buy from them.