[anchpop]

I listen to music for at least 3 hours per day. Assuming two minute songs, that’s 2700 songs per month. Since my spotify subscription is $10/month, that’s about 0.3 cents per song. I’m curious if I listen to much more music than average or what. I often hear that spotify is underpaying artists with complaints like “less than a penny for stream” (google says the average is 0.4 cents), but it doesn’t seem like spotify could be taking a huge cut off the top

[Kye]

The problem is your $10 isn't split among artists you listen to. Your $10 is tossed into a pool with all the other $10s and split depending on deals made with Spotify, not based on listening. That means the vast majority goes to the most popular artists' labels, many (maybe most) you never listened to. Most artists make pennies at best because already successful artists have labels that negotiate better per-stream rates. And they still see very little of it once everyone after Spotify and before the artist takes their cut.

[r3trohack3r]

I think GPs point is, given their streaming habits and what Spotify charges, it’s not possible to pay 1cent per stream on average.

Though my math would be slightly different.

Assuming:

* 3 hours (180 minutes) per day

* 30 days in a month

* $10 subscription

* 3.5 minute average song length

180 * 30 / 3.5 = 1543 streams per month

$10 / 1543 = $0.0065 per stream

So for a listener listening on average 3 hours per day, if Spotify gave away 100% of what they charged the user, they’d still only be able to pay an average of little over 1/2 a cent per stream.

No matter how you distribute that money, unless you charge the user more, there isn’t a way to pass on an entire cent per stream to every artist from that users subscription.

[nivenkos]

Yeah, to achieve that you're looking at a minimum of $25+ per month, and probably more like $60 once you take in to account payment processing fees, the service overhead, label overhead, etc.

And despite all the virtue signalling, there is no way the majority of users would be happy to pay an average of $60+ a month to stream music.