Spotify Hits 130 Million Paid Subscribers, with Monthly Users up 31%

Spotify has hit 130 million paid subscribers in its first quarter of the year. With monthly active users up 31%, the music streaming platform has seen a 22% rise in revenue, despite effects caused by COVID-19.

Reported by TechCrunch, Spotify has seen a fairly lucrative first quarter this year. The Swedish-based company has reported its total earnings of €1.848 billion in a press release. Throughout the duration of Q1, Spotify was able to reach 130 million paid subscribers but amassed a total of 286 monthly users. While premium paid subscribers are up 31%, ad-supported users grew marginally higher at 32%.

Spotify has also mentioned that consumption trends have been affected due to the fact that so many global users are at home due to the COVID-19 virus.

Listening patterns have changed since the start of the coronavirus outbreak. Through the press release, the company states that in late February, the consumption of music and podcasts began to decline. As active users had their daily routines turned upside down, it took time for major markets to rebound. Spotify has said that in the past few weeks “consumption has meaningfully recovered”.

Spotify is well supported on a number of devices including wearables, vehicles, smart home devices, TVs and gaming consoles. While naturally, the usage in cars and wearables took a toll due to the lockdowns around the world. However, Spotify has said usage through TV and consoles has grown “in excess of 50% over the same time period”.

Long term effects caused by COVID-19 on Spotify’s business have yet to be discovered. However, at this current point in time, Spotify has not been hit nearly as much as many other companies throughout this crisis. While there have been positive effects on Spotify’s business, the company is not ignoring how important it is to see the daily lives of its users return and see the economy come back from the pandemic.

Closing out the portion highlighting changes in consumer engagement, the release reads: “While our sincere hope is for some sense of “normalcy” to return to people’s lives as quickly as possible, we do believe our model is uniquely positioned to not just weather this storm, but to come out the other side even stronger.”