Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Music
  3. News

Spotify now has a whopping 30 million paying subscribers

Stephanie Topacio Long
By

how much is spotify premium
Image used with permission by copyright holder
Spotify may have gained a formidable competitor in the music streaming space when Apple Music launched at the end of June 2015, but the company’s user base has continued to grow at a hot pace. Spotify CEO Daniel Ek announced on Twitter today that the number of paying users has now surpassed the 30 million mark, ahead of expectations.

Spotify last released official numbers in June 2015, and at the time, the firm revealed that it had garnered 20 million paying subscribers. The increase of 10 million subscribers in nine months is especially promising compared to the first six months of the year, a period in which only five million paying subscribers signed up. Perhaps CEO Daniel Ek was onto something when he claimed that Apple Music is driving users to Spotify.

Recommended Videos
Related

In his tweet, Ek also hinted that he was excited to see Cuba opening up, apparently referencing Obama’s visit to the country this week. Ek’s comments could foreshadow a possible move for the service into Cuba in the near future. However, considering the average Cuban gets a state salary of around $20 per month, the impoverished country doesn’t seem like a viable move for paying streaming services just yet. Whether Spotify may move its service to Cuba in hopes of padding its 10s of millions of free, ad-based users in the near future remains to be seen.

While Spotify’s latest number is impressive, the streaming service’s estimated growth does appear to fall just short of Apple Music’s over roughly the same period. Apple execs confirmed in February that the service has surpassed 11 million subscribers since its June 30, 2015 launch. That increase can’t be ignored, even if Spotify has a healthy lead right now. Apple Music is expected to reach 20 million subscribers by the end of 2016.

Beyond Spotify and Apple Music, the competition isn’t even close. Deezer, a streaming service based in France, has over 6.3 million users, while Jay-Z’s Tidal only hit the 1 million mark at the end of September. It appears that, at least for the foreseeable future, Spotify and Apple Music will continue to fight for the biggest share of the growing on-demand subscription music streaming market.

Spotify looks poised to remain at the top of the pile, but there are a lot of variables in the relatively new field. No matter how well-positioned Spotify is at the moment, Apple Music is a big enough threat to keep the streamer on its toes.

Updated 3/21/16 by Ryan Waniata: Spotify CEO Daniel Ek has confirmed the service now has 30 million paying subscribers.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Stephanie Topacio Long
Stephanie Topacio Long
Contributor
Stephanie Topacio Long is a writer and editor whose writing interests range from business to books. She also contributes to…
Spotify is finally making it easier to block unwanted followers
spotify block followers hand holing smartphone playing

Spotify is rolling out a new feature that will make it much easier to block people that you don't want following your activity on the service. Until now, subscribers have had no control over who could actually see their listening activity and public playlists. Although you could make a request to Spotify’s customer support team to ask them to block a specific person for you, this required more effort, and many folks didn’t even know it existed. Your other option was to disable the social media part of the service entirely, but that's not an ideal solution for when you do want to share with friends. 

With the new changes, you’ll be able to block someone simply by visiting their user profile and looking for the Block User option in the Three Dots menu at the top. Once you do this, that person won’t be able to access any of your listening activity or even see your profile page. 

Read more
Spotify now powers Delta Air Lines’ seatback music
Spotify on Delta Air Lines In-Flight Entertainment.

Delta Air Lines announced today that is now using Spotify to power the "audio" portion of its in-flight, seatback entertainment.

The partnership brings eight curated playlists to the Delta in-flight entertainment system at launch, including Mood Booster, Are & Be, Hot Country, Mint, Today's Top Hits, Relax & Unwind, RapCaviar, and Ultimate Indie. Rock This, Roots Rising, and ¡Viva Latino! will be all follow in October. Passengers also will have access to more than 40 select podcast series that have been curated by Spotify and Delta.

Read more
Your Philips Hue lights can now sync to the beat of your Spotify music
Philips Hue and Spotify

Smart lights have long been able to sync up with music, but it has always been through your phone's microphone. Philips Hue and Spotify have partnered to create what it calls the "first-ever deep lighting and music experience." The process works by linking the both your Philips Hue and Spotify accounts, and that's where the magic happens.

Philips Hue pulls the metadata from each song played on Spotify, regardless of what device you're playing it on. It then uses an advanced lighting script that causes the lights to shift not only to the beat, but also based on the genre and mood of the song. This means you won't run into the problem of a too-cheerful light show set to the dulcet tones of Helpless as you jam out to Hamilton for what you know is the 175th time.

Read more