Spotify is officially raising its Premium subscription rates in the US come July, following reports of the move in April. The platform is increasing its Individual plan from $11 to $12 monthly and its Duo plan from $15 to $17 monthly — the same jump as last year’s $1 and $2 price hikes, respectively. However, its Family plan is going up by a whopping $3, increasing from $17 to $20 monthly. The only subscribers getting a break are students, who will continue to pay $6 monthly.

Spotify announced the price hikes less than a year after its previous one last July. Before that, Spotify hadn’t raised its fees since launching a decade and a half ago. I guess it was too optimistic to hope the next increase would also take that long, especially with Spotify’s continued focus (and money dump) on audiobooks.

Premium subscribers should receive an email from Spotify in the next month detailing the price hike and providing a link to cancel their plan if they would prefer to do so. Users currently on a trial period for Spotify will get one month at $11 after it ends before being moved up to a $12 monthly fee.

    • foggy@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      I’m all for pirating, but tbh music streaming apps are a service that is still in the “worth it” range. Not where Spotify is going, but, maintaining a library of high quality music with all the assets, and serving it to all your devices over the Internet is not a small feat to do securely.

      I’ll probably switch to tidal for now while I start building up my library to include stuff beyond what I like…

      • PixelAlchemist@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        You should check out Plexamp while you bridge the gap. It has tidal support built in, and you can self-host your own collection as you build it up. Then when you’re done with tidal, you don’t have to learn or download a new app.

        • li10@feddit.uk
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          5 months ago

          Done. Until it can’t find a decent quality option for an album you’re searching for.

          A guy I know decided to move away from Spotify and pirate music. The amount of effort he went through means it’s something I’ll probably never try.

          • ShepherdPie@midwest.social
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            5 months ago

            This is the biggest problem for me. I have thousands of movies and 10s of thousands of TV episodes, but my audio library is still all the same stuff I downloaded from Napster, Limewire, Kazaa 20+ years ago. It’s too hard to find a good selection these days outside of a few private trackers. I’m in several private trackers but I’m not going to sit in a queue for 2 days waiting for an interview time and jump through hoops to join something like RED or PTP tier tracker.

            Not to mention I mostly listen to podcasts these days and when I do listen to music, I try to find new stuff that I’ve never heard of rather than searching for a known artist. This would be way too convoluted to do on my own with some self-hosted solution.

    • Neato@ttrpg.network
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      5 months ago

      As someone else said: it doesn’t replace streaming even a little. Pirating is replacing buying music directly. Streaming facilitates finding new music and trying it out. Being able to listen to anything at any time. You simply can’t do that with downloads; no one can download everything. Piracy in this case really just works for people still listening to their highschool favs and not people looking for new stuff all the time.

      • veee@lemmy.ca
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        5 months ago

        I used to download exclusively when I was younger, but as I get older I’m trying out new genres from different cultures than my own and I’d miss out on it all without a streaming service.

        In my opinion it’s worth it.

      • yeehaw@lemmy.caOP
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        5 months ago

        Yes and no. It’s more cumbersome for sure but I used to find music on YouTube and all that back in the day then download it.

          • RoosterBoy@lemm.ee
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            5 months ago

            Yes, in fact there are modded versions of the Spotify app (idk about apple) to access their library for free.

            • Neato@ttrpg.network
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              5 months ago

              Do they work like ReVanced Youtube and just remove ads/restrictions while keeping account properties? Or do they work like NewPipe and block all the algorithm stuff, use their own accounts/playlists?

  • LCP@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    I don’t mind paying $10/mo for access to millions of songs on demand, even if the caveat is that I don’t own anything at the end of my subscription.

    I understand costs have gone up, so I can accept a $1 increase in subscription. The problem is that Spotify wants to do a bunch of side projects at my expense. I have no interest in podcasts or audiobooks yet I must fork up the extra money to fund it. I have no say in what my money is being used for and I hate that.

    It’s why I moved from it to Tidal and then to Apple Music (even though I’m on Android). Both have their own issues but at least they’re focused on music.

    • GenEcon@lemm.ee
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      5 months ago

      The problem is that Spotify is losing money each year. They aren’t profitable. And if they are keep focusing on music, they never will. Their deal with the music labels says that they need to give 70 % of each subscription to the music labels. So by getting more people to signup, they only marginally increase their revenue. Same goes for raising their prices.

      Thats why they tried focusing on Podcasts and Audiobooks. Those are a lot more profitable, either by adding ads (Podcasts) or by charging a premium (audiobooks).

      • kwirky@lemmy.ca
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        5 months ago

        It’s amazing to think how incompetent their management must be that they’re charging more, delivering lower audio quality, and paying less to artists than competitors like Tidal, yet still aren’t profitable.

        • GenEcon@lemm.ee
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          5 months ago

          They pay less than Tidal claims it pays. So far Tidal has a really bad history of publishing correct numbers.

      • Spedwell@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        There is an episode of Tech Won’t Save Us (2024-01-25) discussing how weird the podcasting play was for Spotify. There is essentially no way to monetize podcasts at scale, primarily because podcasts do not have the same degree of platform look-in as other media types.

        Spotify spent the $100 million (or whatever the number was) to get Rogan exclusive, but for essentially every other podcast you can find a free RSS feed with skippable ads. Also their podcast player just outright sucks :/

      • Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        Hang on. 70% of the subscription before any royalty / streaming costs?

        So in a $10 payment, $7 is immediately removed, then another say $1 for streaming costs leaving only $2 for profits which Spotify takes 30%?

        From each $10 only $1.40 goes to artists?

        • GenEcon@lemm.ee
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          5 months ago

          From the 10 Dollar, taxes will be deducted. Afterwards Apple or Google take their share (if you subscribe using the App). Of the remaining money the Music labels take 70 %, and Spotify keeps 30 %. The music labels pay a fraction of the 70 % to the artists, depending on the contract and the artist’s share of streams reported by Spotify.

    • Manalith@midwest.social
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      5 months ago

      Any particular reason you went from Tidal to Apple Music? I see a lot of people here recommending it, so I’d be interested to hear any negatives it has.

      • LCP@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        The simple reason is because I got a lengthy free trial for it (saving me money on the Tidal sub) and then stuck around.

        Apple Music was hot garbage when I started using it but over the months of my trial it improved tremendously - to a point where there isn’t much difference between it and Tidal. App performance is good now, it provides song recommendations for your playlists, many bugs I was facing have been fixed.

        The Android Auto experience is better for me compared to Tidal, it has Shazam integration (Spotify does too, Tidal doesn’t) and it has many of the Japanese city pop songs I like that Tidal was missing.

        I can always jump ship if needed. Services like Soundiiz and TuneMyMusic make it pretty easy.

    • exanime@lemmy.today
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      5 months ago

      Hope you like Joe Rogan and the crap he peddles because he is getting a nice chunk of Spotify money… I left because of that particular deal

  • AhismaMiasma@lemm.ee
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    5 months ago

    Got the email of subscription increase, just cancelled.

    Been trialling Tidal and we’re both pretty happy with it. Integrates almost as well as Spotify with Android Auto and the sound quality is far better.

    • Grilipper54@sh.itjust.works
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      5 months ago

      I might make the move to tidal as well, I just have a crazy big playlist though on Spotify that would be sad to lose.

      • GbyBE@discuss.tchncs.de
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        5 months ago

        When you create a tidal account they tell you how to transfer your playlists automatically via a 3rd party service (Limited to 500 tracks, unless you pay). Qobuz does the same, but if I’m not mistaken actually partners with the 3rd party service to offer it for free without the 500 track limit.

    • LycanGalen@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      Take a look at Deezer, too. It’s what I went with because it offers high fidelity FLAC audio for paid subscriptions, and integrates with Google home voice commands, which Tidal didn’t when I was looking.

      • killabeezio@lemm.ee
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        5 months ago

        I went with deezer for this reason as well. But deezer has gotten really bad and the interface is just God awful. I recently moved over to tidal and love it. It’s way better than deezer at this point

        • LycanGalen@lemmy.world
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          5 months ago

          I haven’t had any issues with it personally (not invalidating your experience) What has gotten bad about it?

  • kandoh@reddthat.com
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    5 months ago

    Quality isn’t good enough to justify the price. Apple Music and Tidal have better quality of sound.

    • Lianodel@ttrpg.network
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      5 months ago

      even apart from audio quality, Spotify is just plain terrible as a music library.

      For someone who lives in playlists, it might be fine. But I like to pick and choose albums, sometimes even, songs, and be able to navigate it different ways. Spotify, and unfortunately a whole bunch of the competition, will have three separate lists for “liked” songs, albums, and artists. Only want to save the studio tracks, and not the demos and live versions? Fuck you, it’s all or nothing! And the special edition is the only version we have! enjoy the solid hour of shittier versions of the songs you actually wanted!

  • BonesOfTheMoon@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    I was a Google Play Music person and loved it, and then they changed to YouTube. I got mad and tried Apple Music, but as a classical music lover it’s vastly less than ideal for several reasons, so I went to Spotify and realized they liked to shuffle Britney Spears into me listening to lieder, so I went back to YouTube because at least they didn’t do that. But it’s just so basic compared to the absolute perfection that was GPM, and difficult to navigate. I don’t know where to go next. I’ve been buying records on Bandcamp but I also like the streaming service to discover music with.

    • bc93@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      Qobuz is the best for classical music, for sure - either that or piracy. I’d probably go with piracy

    • ezvk@lemm.ee
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      5 months ago

      You should get back to apple music, they launched an app dedicated to classical music, and it’s by far the best for this type of music. Also it’s lossless 24 bits

      • BonesOfTheMoon@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        Unfortunately due to licensing there’s a lot of stuff I want they don’t have, and some of it I can’t purchase.

    • FarFarAway@startrek.website
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      5 months ago

      You could check out deezer. It’s European and they have a classical music section. Not sure how good it is. It’s like $110 for a yearly subscription and they offer hi-fi streaming. Just another option for you to check out. 🤷

    • GbyBE@discuss.tchncs.de
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      5 months ago

      If you like classical music, give qobuz a try… High quality audio, large selection of classical music.

    • itstoowet@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      I was also a Google music enjoyer and also find the other streaming options pretty crappy. I’ve actually moved over to more curated options like internet radio for when I’m not in the mood for anything specific. Shout-out to NTS, I love you.

    • jeremyparker@programming.dev
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      5 months ago

      If you like to upload your own music (like Google music), iBroadcast is the tippy tops. You can still use bandcamp (with or without yt-dlp) for discovery, and then upload what you like to iBroadcast.

    • TheOakTree@lemm.ee
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      5 months ago

      Just to let you know, Tidal is not that great either.

      Frequently having issues with downloaded albums, where I go into offline mode, pull up an album, and it says “can’t connect” despite being in offline mode and the album taking up storage space on my phone.

      Also, the discovery and new releases sections aren’t very well made.

      • BonesOfTheMoon@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        It doesn’t sound great. Maybe I’ll just use Bandcamp only. It’s just some classical albums are only on certain platforms.

        • Screemu@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          5 months ago

          High chance they’re all on Slsk as lossless files. That and foobar2000 and you’ll be back in control of your music listening habits. Then buy physical from the artists if you want to support them and they offer a way to obtain it.

  • IzzyScissor@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    Prices will continue to go up until the number of subscribers lost due to the price increase outweighs the additional profit from the subscribers who agree to pay the higher amount.

    Capitalism machine goes brrrrrrr

      • archomrade [he/him]@midwest.social
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        5 months ago

        Platform agnostic = you own the mp3/FLACC/ect file, and can play it through whatever client you want

        Platform Locked = you do not own the files, and they are DRM locked to their proprietary media player (see: spotify, kindle, ect)

        Of course there are ways around those locks, but it’s illegal to remove DRM protections (in the us)

        • lud@lemm.ee
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          5 months ago

          You can switch to another service any time you want though.

                • where_am_i@sh.itjust.works
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                  5 months ago

                  BS. One new CD is at least 10$. A good band collection is then a year worth of subscription fees. So, do you only listen to a few bands?

                  Before Spotify I pirated everything. In lossless, ofc. I had 200GB of music, it wouldn’t fit on my ipod classic, and I still was limited.

                  I pirated at least a lifetime worth of Spotify premium and yet when I switched to Spotify I discovered so many more artists like the ones I already liked. If I now tried to buy all the songs I’ve listened to more than once in the last 5 years, I’d go bankrupt.

                  Spotify is way cheaper.

                  (now add ease of discovering new music, listening to whatever your friends want to listen to in a car, collaborative playlists, etc etc)

  • Kongar@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    5 months ago

    More money More crap nobody wants like audio books Still haven’t seen cd quality streaming yet

    I used to happy with Spotify before the enshitificatuon happened…

      • Manalith@midwest.social
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        5 months ago

        I have used Spotify’s 15 free hours a month for shorter light novels, but beyond that, buying the rights to listen to a book, or buying more listening hours is very much not worth it through them.

  • Hucklebee@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    About 10 years ago I got rid of most of my cd’s because I thought I would just use spotify. Now I’m slowly gathering a cd collection again from thriftstores (or buy albums in store if it’s newer music and I want to support the artist). I rip them all to flac and add them to my Plex.

    I’ve noticed I listen to music more now. I find new cool songs by artists by listening through whole albums again. Because of the time commitment of ripping and physically flipping through cd’s, I actually care again about the music that I gather and listen.

    • x0chi@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      There should be a app that worked with most music players and with the data suggest new things to try. Something that worked with local players, streaming players, etc. Something like the concept of last.fm but with good suggestions.

      I can’t believe that these days we don’t get one app like that. Even streaming apps with all the data they got from listing hours and still fail around 40 to 60% with my suggestions, and rarely suggest something that I haven’t heard before.

      Nowadays with the state of efficient AI in learning from patterns, and still nothing mind-blowing like a kind of MiniMe that has almost the same tastes but have heard more stuff than you and can recommend as a more educated version of you. That is something that I would want to, hell if it worked so well and to have it, I would have to pay , then I would pay up to a price.

    • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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      5 months ago

      Eh, I just switched to audiobooks. I get them from my library and listen while I drive, work in the yard, ride my bike, etc.

      I’d really like a self-hosted smart speaker though that I could call out a song and it would play. So like Alexa, but all the AI is local. I’m willing to pay for the music service, but I need to own the platform and be able to change music services easily. The only time I really listen to music is when entertaining friends/family, and using my phone is getting old.

  • CosmoNova@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    Well considering the last price hike got us gems like the music 8-ball/magic crystal thing, I can barely wait to see what banger they’ll come up with to bloat my music player with next.

    • Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      5 months ago

      And removal of much of Spotify curated playlists…
      So mad about that part >:(

      Every “Zusammengestellt für” playlist is a autogenerated playlist and probably not a single human touched that shit. So much less discoverability.

      • Oweneds@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        I HATE these ‘made for you’ playlists, just repeats of my liked songs and songs it’s always trying to shove down my throat. Some of them barely fit the genre/vibe of the playlist too.

        Part of the original appeal of Spotify for me years ago was the curated playlists.