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Spotify on Tuesday released its annualLoud & Clear write up , detailing information about the music stream service ’s royalty payments . While Spotify revealed before this class that itpaid out $ 10 billionto the euphony diligence in 2024 , the new account offers more in - depth numbers about its payments in an effort todispel reportsthat the fellowship does n’t reward artist properly for their work .
For the first time ever , an artist who received one in every million streams on Spotify generated over $ 10,000 on average in 2024 , which is 10x what the same streamshare would have generated a decade ago , the write up says .
While Spotify is touting the amount it has paid out to creative person and songwriters , many are demand fair recompense from the cyclosis serve . A few weeks ago , a number of Grammy - constitute songwritersboycotted Spotify ’s ballad maker of the yearGrammy party because of the music streaming Robert William Service ’s decreasing royalties . Due to a modification introduced by Spotify last year , Billboard has estimatedthat writer stand to mislay about $ 150 million over 12 months .
In accession , anew report from Duetti(that Spotify has dismiss in aprevious statement to TechCrunch ) found that Apple Music still pays artists twice as much as Spotify . It find that Spotify devote artists $ 3 per 1,000 flow , while other platforms like Amazon Music , Apple Music , and YouTube paid $ 8.80 , $ 6.20 , and $ 4.80 , respectively , per 1,000 flow in 2024 .
Spotify ’s new report attempt to dismiss these written report and concerns . The report detail the caller ’s payout fashion model to explain how artist and publishers take in tax income on its platform .
“ Major streaming services all calculate payouts the same way : based on streamshare ( if an creative person ’s catalog accounts for 1 % of full streams , it would realize 1 % of total royalties ) , ” the party explained in its account . “ Still , misconceptions about ‘ per - stream rates ’ remain far-flung . Streaming services do n’t pay out based on a fixed per - stream charge per unit — just like listeners do n’t pay off per song they listen to . ”
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The Union of Musicians and Allied Workers ( UMAW ) has been call for Spotify to fairly compensate artists , especially autonomous and smaller artists who are struggling to make a living . Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib and Congressman Jamaal Bowman last year insert theLiving Wage for Musicians Actin partnership with UMAW , detailing a proposal that aim to increase pour royalty for musician to one cent per current .
“ It ’s easy to calculate what Spotify pays directly to recording creative person : $ 0 , ” a spokesperson for UMAW said in a argument to TechCrunch .
“ There is no direct payment to recording artists by Spotify , because the company claims its manner of streaming falls under no existing regularisation or requirement for unmediated payments to musician — unlike other digital platform like satellite wireless , internet programme , or ‘ non - interactive ’ streaming , all of which pay transcription artists directly . This needs to change , obviously . UMAW supports the Living Wage for Musicians Act to close this loophole and make streaming pay the musicians who make the content for Spotify and other political program , ” the assertion reason .
Spotify ’s report touts that its payments are getting good , despite concerns from the industry .
The account reveals that the figure of artist get royalties has tripled since 2017 . A decade ago , the top artist on Spotify garner just over $ 5 million , while today , more than 200 artists have surpassed that milestone .
Over the past tenner , the 10,000th - ranked creative person on Spotify has seen their royalties increase almost 4x – from $ 34,000 to $ 131,000 , while the 100,000th - ranked artist has seen their generated royal house procreate by over 10x — increasing from under $ 600 in 2014 to almost $ 6,000 in 2024 .
In addition , the ship’s company bring out that nearly 1,500 artists generated over $ 1 million in royalty from Spotify alone last year . Spotify notes that 80 % of these artist did n’t have a song hit the Spotify Global Daily Top 50 chart in 2024 , which means that many of them are n’t family figure .
Spotify also portion out that the creative person who generated at least $ 100,000 in royalties were record music in over 50 lyric in 2024 , while the artists who engender at least $ 1 million on Spotify recorded medicine in 17 different languages .
