Spotify Surpasses 50 Million Subscribers in the U.S. — But Apple Music Wins in the Most Important Subscriber Category

Digital Products Spotify currently has more than 50 million paying subscribers in the U.S., according to recent data reviewed by Digital Music News, but Apple Music is larger in its most lucrative membership category.

In every discussion of the music industry, Spotify seems to be seen as the dominant giant in the streaming music space, but how dominant is it compared to rivals like Apple Music, Amazon Music, and YouTube Music, especially in the US?

According to some royalty data shared by major publishers and verified by Digital Music News, the game appears to be more competitive than we previously thought.

Data shows (specifically from February of this year) that Spotify has more paid subscribers overall than Apple Music when weighted to take into account all plan packages (individual, family, student, etc.) However, when it comes to the most valuable package, the individual subscriber plan, Apple Music beats Spotify in the US.

Given the ongoing fierce battle between Spotify and the music publishing industry, this revelation could be significant. Let’s break down the numbers.

Spotify has roughly 50 million total subscribers in the U.S., far more than Apple Music’s roughly 34 million. While that seems like a big lead, Spotify is being overtaken by Apple in the lucrative “individual subscriber” category.

In this key category, Spotify’s subscriber numbers are not that high, at 20.2 million compared to Apple Music’s 20.8 million.

Of the Apple Music total, 19.1 million are traditional individual subscriptions and about 1.73 million are packaged Apple One subscriptions that include Apple Music, Apple TV, Apple Arcade, and iCloud at a discounted price.

Spotify’s roughly 50 million total is backed by Family, Duo and Student plans which have certain multipliers or discounts applied for royalty calculation purposes (for example, the Family plan has a 1.75x multiplier applied by certain publishers, while the Student plan has a 0.5x multiplier).

More recently, National Music Publishers Association (NMPA) President David Israelite pointed to Spotify’s “approximately 50 million subscribers,” but data provided to DMN (with the appropriate multiplier) puts Spotify’s total subscriber count at just over 50 million.

Importantly, the royalty multiplier shared with DMN is a different methodology than Spotify applied. According to Spotify’s financial disclosures, for Individual and Student plans, a subscriber is naturally counted as “1.” For Family and Duo plans, the number is determined by the actual number of family members or friends who join the account (for example, if only two additional family members join a plan that can accommodate up to six people, the total number of subscribers reported by Spotify will be three).

So, what does this mean for Spotify’s market share?

This is a crucial question in the context of a heated legal battle between Spotify and the music publishing industry. In its recent lawsuit against Spotify, MLC estimated total damages from Spotify’s bundled music plans and associated royalty discounts at approximately $150 million per year, although this figure may represent a more controlling position in market share.

Last year, NMPASpotify has 44.4 million subscribers in the USMeanwhile, Apple Music has 32.6 million. These figures give Spotify roughly 38% market share among U.S.-based competing DSPs, at least when using the competing platforms introduced at the membership conference.

Please note that we are still collecting more detailed data on subscriber numbers for other streaming platforms, such as Amazon Music, for 2024. Stay tuned for the latest market share estimates.

Spotify claims to have 239 million paid subscribers worldwide. Latest quarterly earnings announcement.

This isn’t the first time Apple Music has seriously challenged Spotify in the US.

In 2018, Digital Music News reported that Apple MusicExceeded Spotify’s total Spotify announced that Apple Music had gained subscribers in the U.S., following an earlier report by The Wall Street Journal that showed Apple Music’s subscriber numbers were growing faster. Since then, the two platforms have been locked in a fierce battle, with Spotify embroiled in antitrust disputes with Apple in the U.S. and Europe.

Apple doesn’t release music-specific subscriber data, and Spotify doesn’t release U.S.-specific (or country-specific) subscriber information, and neither company agreed to share their U.S.-specific subscriber data for this article.