Spotify growing even faster thanks to launch of Apple Music, VP says

Spotify has actually seen its business accelerate since Apple Music was launched in June 2015, a vice president with the company said on Monday, crediting the extra attention drawn to streaming services.

"Since Apple Music started we've been growing quicker and adding more users than before," Jonathan Forster explained in an interview with Reuters. Spotify now has almost 100 million subscribers, about 30 million of which are paid Premium subscribers.

Apple Music has approximately 13 million paid customers, but no free tier outside of three-month trials and Beats 1 radio. The service is however available in over 100 countries, whereas Spotify is in closer to 60.

"It would be terrible if we were just taking each other's users or to learn there was just a ceiling of 100 million users — I don't think that is the case," Forster added, while also suggesting that music streaming is a "hard business" that will probably limit the number of participants.

Earlier today Spotify revealed plans to introduce original video programming on top of the third-party video already available to mobile users. Apple Music's forays into video have been comparatively limited so far.

The service is, however, expected to get a revamp at WWDC, primarily through a new interface, but also possibly with expanded Beats 1 radio. Apple may additionally "demote" the service's Connect feature once iOS 10 is launched later this year.

25 Comments

rogifan_new 4297 comments · 9 Years

About 8 years ago

I don't get what one has to do with the other. I have a hard time believing there were all these people holding out on signing up for a streaming music service because Apple wasn't in the game yet. But I think this signals that Music isn't compelling enough yet to get people to ditch existing options.

lkrupp 10521 comments · 19 Years

rogifan_new said:

I don't get what one has to do with the other. I have a hard time believing there were all these people holding out on signing up for a streaming music service because Apple wasn't in the game yet. But I think this signals that Music isn't compelling enough yet to get people to ditch existing options.

Blathering nonsense. Apple Music is more than compelling over the likes of Spotify. It’s just become more fashionable to bash Apple services while claiming to be a fan of the platform.

foggyhill 4767 comments · 10 Years

rogifan_new said:

I don't get what one has to do with the other. I have a hard time believing there were all these people holding out on signing up for a streaming music service because Apple wasn't in the game yet. But I think this signals that Music isn't compelling enough yet to get people to ditch existing options.

Apple's heavy marketing expanded the market, just like they expanded the smart phone market when they came in (and Android profited from places Apple would not go).
Spotify's getting a lot from that because they were already a known entitity in this space and thus were a more mature solution.
Contrary to Android though, in this area, Apple can, and will eventually compete in all areas Spotify is or will be. They better enjoy the collateral growth they're getting now because it will get rough in the next few years as Google and Apple step into their spot.

NY1822 620 comments · 8 Years

"30 million paid Premium subs"....wonder how many of those are paying $1 for 3 months...
http://www.hypebot.com/hypebot/2015/05/1-for-3-months-of-spotify-premium-is-back-but-with-no-ads-how-are-artists-label-getting-paid.html

djsherly 1029 comments · 15 Years

lkrupp said:

rogifan_new said:

I don't get what one has to do with the other. I have a hard time believing there were all these people holding out on signing up for a streaming music service because Apple wasn't in the game yet. But I think this signals that Music isn't compelling enough yet to get people to ditch existing options.

Blathering nonsense. Apple Music is more than compelling over the likes of Spotify. It’s just become more fashionable to bash Apple services while claiming to be a fan of the platform.

I've got Apple Music for free with my phone plan and I still pay for and use Spotify in preference because it does one thing well. Stream music.

Apple Music is like its keynote. A bit of a mess really.