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.
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.
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.
It’s a good thing we haven’t risen Wages between last Price Hike and this Price Hike. Otherwise Spotify might be forced to Raise Their Prices!