Spotify added 10 million new Premium subscribers to its platform in the final three months of 2022, bringing the total number of Premium users for the streaming titan to 205 MILLION. The Q4 stats far exceed those projected for the streaming service, who gained a total of 33 million new active users in this time period (free and paid). This brings the total overall number of users active on Spotify to 489 million, up 20%. Spotify credits this growth to “promotional intake and household plans,” citing successful campaigns such as the Spotify Wrapped campaigns, which drew significantly more engagement than the year prior.
As the results became public, the price of Spotify shares jumped on Tuesday, popping 12%. The company’s projected Q4 stats had anticipated ending 2022 with 202 million paid subscribers, and 479 million total monthly active users, which they have easily surpassed. This growth comes amidst recent staff cuts at the company. Last week, Spotify cut around 6% of its workforce, laying off around 600 employees.
On Tuesday, Spotify founder and CEO Daniel Ek said he had “overinvested” in Spotify, thus the need for staff cuts. “I still believe it was the right call to invest, and I would do it again,” Ek said. “But things change, and the macro-environment has changed significantly in the last year. And in hindsight, I probably got a little carried away and overinvested relative to the uncertainty we saw shaping up in the market.”
See a tweet from Ek breaking down Spotify’s Q4 stats below.
Q4 ‘22 $SPOT delivered great platform growth. We ended 2022 strongly despite a challenging year. Expect us to move faster with more intensity of effort, driving even greater efficiency in 2023. pic.twitter.com/rII7hHwRy1
— Daniel Ek (@eldsjal) January 31, 2023
