Should you’re a Spotify Premium subscriber within the US, prepare to begin paying extra for the privilege: the music streaming service is seemingly going to lift its particular person plan costs within the US for the primary time since its launch there 12 years in the past.
This comes from The Wall Avenue Journal (by way of The Verge), so whereas it is not official but, it is trying very possible. The price of a person premium plan is “anticipated” to be going up from $9.99 a month to $10.99 a month sooner or later subsequent week.
We noticed a bunch of Spotify value hikes again in 2021, however the one plan that noticed a value enhance within the US was the Household plan – it went from $14.99 to $15.99. Now it is particular person subscribers who’re going to be paying extra.
With none assertion from Spotify but, it is not clear why the change is going on, or the way it would possibly profit artists. Nevertheless, this is not fully surprising: Spotify CEO Daniel Ek hinted that value rises had been on the best way again in April of this yr.
The price of streaming
The music streaming providers are clearly struggling to make the monetary sums add up, whereas firm executives have gone on file as saying that these platforms can doubtlessly push their costs increased with out shedding too many subscribers.
Final yr Apple bumped up the month-to-month price of each Apple Music and Apple TV Plus, which the corporate mentioned was as a result of “a rise in licensing prices”. Apple additionally mentioned that artists can be higher compensated for his or her music due to the worth will increase.
Again in February, Amazon Music elevated the price of its personal subscriptions, after which Tidal adopted go well with earlier this month. Taking these traits into consideration, it is actually no shock that Spotify is about to make these modifications.
The shift we have seen from bodily to digital media, after which to a month-to-month subscription streaming mannequin, have clearly upended the music business over the past couple of a long time – and the brand new platforms are nonetheless understanding what a good value for immediate entry to tens of hundreds of thousands of songs must be.