Spotify subscription plan growth and total Monthly Active User growth. SOURCE: Spotify earning reports.
Spotify will launch a third subscription tier to its legacy two-tier access, introducing a “Supremium” plan above its current subscription and free-listening options. This according the Ashley Carman’s reporting at Bloomberg, which cites its sources anonymously. We do not have Spotify’s confirmation.
The news is plausible. In the company’s Q1 earnings report (see RAIN coverage HERE), CEO Daniel Ek answered an investor’s question about raising rates this way: “We raised prices in 46 places last year. I would like and hope for us to do that in 2023 as well, but we’re in discussion with our partners, so that’s really a negotiation thing.” He noted “We have many tools at our disposal.”
The Bloomberg article offers newly reported details. Rather than merely raise rates on existing use cases, Spotify is planning a third tier internally named “Supremium,” which will offer HiRez listening. Amazon Music and Apple Music both offer lossless HiFi listening in their normal subscription tiers. Apple Music is priced at $10.99 per month while Spotify has held resolutely to the $9.99 fee. So the customer proposition of paying a dollar more for HiRez listening is plausible.
Spotify is also planning (according to Bloomberg) to release its audiobook library to current Premium subscribers at no extra charge; it is currently available as a cost-per-unit store to all Spotify users.
