Spotify Grows to 87M Paid Subscribers and 191M Monthly Active Users

[MacRumors]

Spotify today reported its third quarter earnings for 2018, announcing that paid subscribers for its streaming music service have grown to 87 million and total monthly active users (including the free tier) now reach 191 million. This is an increase from 83 million paid subscribers and 180 million total users that Spotify had in July 2018.

In terms of year-over-year growth, paid subscriber numbers have grown 40 percent in comparison to 2017 and MAUs have grown 28 percent. Spotify touted its various multi-partner bundles as a big help to signing up new subscribers, which are also retaining users for longer and driving churn lower. The latest bundle includes Spotify, Hulu, and Showtime for $4.99/month for students.

Spotify is in an ongoing race with Apple Music to add more subscribers, and as of now Spotify is still winning in terms of paid subscribers. It's been a while since we've heard news of updated Apple Music subscriber numbers, with the last count in April 2018 putting Apple's service at 40 million paid subscribers. Apple Music does not have a free tier like Spotify, but counting users on the three-month free trial along with paid users, Apple's service hit over 50 million subscribers in May 2018.

These numbers refer to global paid subscriber users, and in a report over the summer it was suggested that Apple Music is actually ahead of Spotify's paid subscriber count in the United States. Both Apple Music and Spotify were said to have more than 20 million paid subscribers in the U.S. as of July 2018, and at the time Apple was "a hair ahead" of its rival.

Looking into the fourth quarter of 2018, Spotify expects paid subscribers to reach 93-96 million users, while monthly active users are predicted to break the 200 million user milestone and sit somewhere between 199-206 million users globally.

Article Link: Spotify Grows to 87M Paid Subscribers and 191M Monthly Active Users

 

[JosephAW]

I'm one of the "active users."

 

[AppleWarMachine]

and still no Spotify watch app

 

[Mad.Whack]

and still no Spotify watch app

Do we know of a reason why? My money is on apple not allowing functionality (offline playlist, LTE streaming or other)
Samsung's Gear S3 has had a spotify app for a long time (years?).. IMO it's their ONLY excellent third party gear S3 app.

 

[Mac03ForLife]

As am I

 

[4jasontv]

The best part of these services isn’t their song selection but rather the way salespeople in stores and chatty people on the bus leave me alone when they think I am listening to something.

Well worth $10 a month.

 

[Aston441]

Oh now I understand why Apple won't allow third party streaming apps on the watch: Spotify

It's too bad. I'd love to have streaming TuneIn and Amazon Music on my watch.

Oh well.

 

[jayducharme]

I know students who have taken advantage of Spotify's bundle. But that can't be helping Spotify's bottom line much. And with streaming services, there's less allegiance. Since you never have the actual content, any service can provide what you're looking for. All that ties someone in is satisfaction with the service.

 

[Dwalls90]

I switched from Apple Music to Spotify about 1.5 years ago. However, I am so heavily integrated into Apple's ecosystem that due to Spotify not making a native app available across all of Apple's hardware I may consider going back to Apple Music. Apple Music has also made a lot of strategic acquisitions and increased functionality in recent years, and given the rumors of iOS' redesign (and therefore presumably Apple Music), that may be enough to at least turn me back to Apple Music.

and still no Spotify watch app

Oh now I understand why Apple won't allow third party streaming apps on the watch: Spotify

It's too bad. I'd love to have streaming TuneIn and Amazon Music on my watch.

Oh well.

My understanding as to why Spotify does not have Apps across Apple's ecosystem (TvOS, WatchOS, etc.) is actually Spotify's lack of interest and not Apple's fault. In a time where competition is hotter than ever in this industry, it's mind-blowing Spotify is not being more aggressive by having native apps/support on all mainstream hardware (especially Apple's).

 

[Ebok]

I’m loving Spotify more than Apple Music. Discovering more songs and because of a promo where I live, I got it free for a year.

Apple Music layout is also an eye sore.

(was an Apple Music user for 2yrs)

 

[WWPD]

I tried Spotify but nothing about it warranted a switch from Apple Music. The fact that the Music app is built in and Siri integration is why I stay.

 

[applepuree]

I prefer Spotify music discovery over Apple Music. I also find Apple Music mostly suggests American Rap and hip hop, both of which I don't like and therefore don't listen to. Strangely, Apple Music (al least on Homepod), can never find music I have bought via iTunes and have in my iTunes Match account.

 

[FSMBP]

I tried Spotify but nothing about it warranted a switch from Apple Music. The fact that the Music app is built in and Siri integration is why I stay.

That's awful and hurts consumers (anti-competitiveness). The fact that ever iPhone comes with Apple Music built in and constantly nags you when in iTunes, is probably a huge reason why they're number 1.

Unfair advantage. Oh well! Apple Music may be a better service but I'd rather have equal options.

 

[nburwell]

In terms of the music streaming game, it's really between Spotify and Apple... Then everyone else (Tidal, Pandora, Google Music, etc.)

 

[Bawstun]

I’m loving Spotify more than Apple Music. Discovering more songs and because of a promo where I live, I got it free for a year.

Apple Music layout is also an eye sore.

(was an Apple Music user for 2yrs)

So much this. Spotify is simply the better app and service, in almost every measureable metric. User interface, song discovery algorithms, features and controls, etc etc.

Anyone who says Apple Music is better is simply flat-out wrong, IMO.

 

[MacFan23]

Do we know of a reason why? My money is on apple not allowing functionality (offline playlist, LTE streaming or other)
Samsung's Gear S3 has had a spotify app for a long time (years?).. IMO it's their ONLY excellent third party gear S3 app.

I'm not so sure, I remember having to use the blown up iPhone app on my iPad for far too long after the iPad came out.

Just checked the dates.

iPad launched April 2010, Spotify app came May 2012.

 

[unobtainium]

I wish Apple would invest a little money in their music discovery algorithms. I’ve found so many niche artists and songs I absolutely love over the past few years with Spotify, but Apple seems to suggest nothing but mainstream radio hits or hip hop. It’s baffling because Apple has nearly unlimited resources to devise algorithms of their own. I’m starting to suspect the problem is the user base of the two platforms. Spotify partly works by suggesting songs that users with similar taste listen to. Maybe Apple Music doesn’t have enough listeners that listen to things other than rap or mainstream pop?

 

[4jasontv]

That's awful and hurts consumers (anti-competitiveness). The fact that ever iPhone comes with Apple Music built in and constantly nags you when in iTunes, is probably a huge reason why they're number 1.

Unfair advantage. Oh well! Apple Music may be a better service but I'd rather have equal options.

The fact that Apple Music autoplays the first song in the library when I charge my phone in my car is why Apple Music isn’t even installed on my devices.

 

[cgaw23]

I prefer Spotify music discovery over Apple Music. I also find Apple Music mostly suggests American Rap and hip hop, both of which I don't like and therefore don't listen to. Strangely, Apple Music (al least on Homepod), can never find music I have bought via iTunes and have in my iTunes Match account.

I haven’t noticed since before iOS 12 but there have been times when I have searched for a song to play that I knew I had with iTunes Match and it wouldn’t display for me, I could only access by scrolling to its location under songs

 

[rwilliams]

Do we know of a reason why? My money is on apple not allowing functionality (offline playlist, LTE streaming or other)
Samsung's Gear S3 has had a spotify app for a long time (years?).. IMO it's their ONLY excellent third party gear S3 app.

Marco Arment, the developer of the Overcast podcast app, said that he couldn't implement streaming in the standalone watch app because of Apple's restrictions. So that probably explains why Spotify hasn't bothered making one.

 

[Dwalls90]

Marco Arment, the developer of the Overcast podcast app, said that he couldn't implement streaming in the standalone watch app because of Apple's restrictions. So that probably explains why Spotify hasn't bothered making one.

You can stream. I have streamed podcasts from my Apple Watch 4 using Overcast.

 

[genovelle]

So much this. Spotify is simply the better app and service, in almost every measureable metric. User interface, song discovery algorithms, features and controls, etc etc.

Anyone who says Apple Music is better is simply flat-out wrong, IMO.

I disagree. I have both and absolutely hate Spotify. I have it because I have some of my music there, but it’s awkward for my tastes

 

[Mitochris]

I know students who have taken advantage of Spotify's bundle. But that can't be helping Spotify's bottom line much. And with streaming services, there's less allegiance. Since you never have the actual content, any service can provide what you're looking for. All that ties someone in is satisfaction with the service.

And the service is why I am a paying user for over 8 years now. Never had an issue with them.

 

[Jmausmuc]

That's awful and hurts consumers (anti-competitiveness). The fact that ever iPhone comes with Apple Music built in and constantly nags you when in iTunes, is probably a huge reason why they're number 1.

Unfair advantage. Oh well! Apple Music may be a better service but I'd rather have equal options.

I am a Spotify user myself (like it better than Apple Music) but I wouldn’t call this an unfair advantage.

Apple makes the iPhone. I think they should be able to do whatever they want with it. There is a substitute for almost all of the native apps. Do you think the iPhone should come without any apps so more people will download skype for calling, Spotify for music, opera for web browsing and so on?

 

[JamesMay82]

How many of you streamers had a music collection to begin with that you abandoned in favour of streaming?

I love the idea of streaming but it feels wasteful to abandon my collection.. I feel like I might just be better to keep buying cds/iTunes as

The only bummer for me is that sonos doesn’t stream purchased music from my phone as well as it does with streaming services