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

[WiseAJ]

What a shockingly short-sighted comment. It's okay for Apple to ignore a technology if it is not the "majority" but on the other hand it is great if they remove a tech that is in use by the majority (headphone jack).



Mike

The headphone jack is on the way out for consumer uses. Whereas 4K is newborn baby that's just starting to become somewhat affordable for the average joe if they really want it.

Apple will support 4K eventually, it just hasn't been a priority for them to add it in yet because of the lack of 4K content and 4K TV owners. That might change soon with Amazon and Netflix now offering 4K video, we shall see when Apple next updates their Apple TV.

In both cases I'm not affected. I don't have a 4K TV and not likely to get one anytime soon and I don't need a headphone jack I've fully converted over to the AirPods and no way am I going back to life before them.

 

[derbothaus]

I don't pay any money for 256 kbit/s music. Do you buy a pepperoni pizza with 3 pieces of pepperoni? I don't. Garbage quality. If Apple wants to really compete they would offer lossless for under $15/month. I don't pay for Spotify for the same reason. 320 kbit/s also sucks to pay for. And before all you apple earbud users say you can't tell any difference you have your own answer, You use a crap DAC and inferior speakers. You use apple or beats or bose outboard gear and it is 'tuned' to help you hear less crap (ie. extreme mid bass humps). But it is still crap. You-tube quality. Don't let them charge for ****.

 

[Rossatron]

Oops

 

[Uofmtiger]

I switched recently from Spotify to Apple Music.

I had been using Spotify long before AM launched but after giving the three month trial a go I decided to stick with Spotify because the Apple Music app was a buggy mess with an awkward UI, I decided to give it another chance recently and after a few teething troubles I've decided to stick with Apple Music for the time being. I have been very critical of it in the past but I do think it has improved a lot.

Honestly I still prefer Spotifys app, the look and feel and UI but I like Apples curated playlists more than Spotify, strangely I never found Discover Weekly particularly compelling which I realise isn't most peoples experience, and have found some music on AM that isn't available on Spotify. The clincher for me was reading these articles that show that Apple are paying artists considerably more than Spotify.

I can deal with a slightly less well thought out interface if I know that an artist is benefitting.

Personally, I preferred Rdio over Spotify and I preferred Apple Music over Rdio. The main reason is the "For You" section was best out of the gate. That being said, the most important feature of AM is Siri, and without it, Spotify isn't even interesting to me. Just the benefit of using Siri with the Apple Watch in the car makes it a better service for me than Spotify. Also, I was already using iTunes Match when AM came out and it allowed me to access everything in one app.

Spotify has some nice features, especially the fact that it is built into many third party products, but I use MacOS and iOS more than my Amazon Echo, so it comes down to being supported by the right products. If Apple updated Siri to work with Spotify, I might give Spotify another look, though. I get special offers from them all the time, but it isn't even worth bothering with at this point.

I can see why people that aren't in Apple's ecosystem would prefer Spotify, though.

 

[fatboyslick]

The 50 million paying users of Spotify know you are wrong, but then so do you. What we don't know is why you say it anyway.

His point being that the free tier hooked in millions of users in the first place.
That 50million paid users all likely tried the free service first and then committed to paying.
It's a tried and trusted sales technique

 

[whsbuss]

His point being that the free tier hooked in millions of users in the first place.
That 50million paid users all likely tried the free service first and then committed to paying.
It's a tried and trusted sales technique

And Spotify's algorithm of increasing ads the more you listen, means stop listening or pay up.

 

[brandonmcconnell]

And lets face it, the only reason Spotify has had the success they have had is due to millennials wanting everything for free. I don't understand why artists continue to let Spotify and YouTube give out their content for free.

Hello. Millennial here. I pay for both. Apple Music SUCKS, and I only subscribe to it for the convenience of using it with other apps and Siri. Spotify is where I run to for new content, ranking, creating playlists, collaborating, and exploring. It's the hub of music, and it's far from free. Same as Apple Music, artists and labels get paid per listen (or thousand lists), and Spotify makes its profits off of premium subscribers and ads.

 

[akash.nu]

Hello. Millennial here. I pay for both. Apple Music SUCKS, and I only subscribe to it for the convenience of using it with other apps and Siri. Spotify is where I run to for new content, ranking, creating playlists, collaborating, and exploring. It's the hub of music, and it's far from free. Same as Apple Music, artists and labels get paid per listen (or thousand lists), and Spotify makes its profits off of premium subscribers and ads.

Spotify doesn't make any profit. Still running on venture capital & seed funding.

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/techcrunch.com/2016/03/29/stream-with-the-devil/amp/

 

[kironin]

You guys do realize that the free Spotify tier has commercials? That generates revenue for Spotify that you are not factoring into your analysis.

NYT June 15

"... [Spotify] revenue growth has slowed — last year, revenue increased 78 percent from the year before — and its losses are mounting. In 2016, Spotify’s net loss totaled about $600 million, up from about $257 million the year before. The company attributed this increase to the costs of servicing its debt — it raised $1 billion last year in convertible debt — and to the effects of foreign exchange rates.

Since the company began, the costs of paying record labels and others for licensing rights has been by far its biggest expense, and the more its users click, the more Spotify must pay. According to a company statement, royalty and distribution costs equaled nearly 85 percent of its revenue. Add in nearly $900 million in salaries, marketing, product development and other costs, and, once again, expenses far exceeded revenues."