A revamped version of Spotify’s free service is reportedly in the works

NelsonG · April 10, 2018

Spotify’s got something big up its sleeve, that much we know for sure. The music streaming service has a big event in the works for April 24 in New York — though it hasn’t really offered up anything useful beyond that. A revamped version of the company’s free tier could certainly make sense for the event.

A new report from Bloomberg suggests that such a thing is on the way, as the company looks to make big moves after going public. According to the piece, the new version of the app will make it easier for users to use the ad-supported service on mobile devices. There’s not a lot of information beyond that, however — including how Spotify would continue to differentiate a paid tier in order to keep premium subscribers on-board.

Of course, the free offering is one of the key elements differentiating the service from competition like Apple Music. It hasn’t been the most popular feature among record labels and artists, for obvious reasons, but it’s helped Spotify maintain a healthy lead in the category. Last month, Apple Music announced that it was continuing to grow at a healthy rate, with 38 million subscribers.

That number is dwarfed, however, by Spotify’s 71 million subscribers — and doubly so by its total 159 million users. Clearly the multi-tiered strategy has been a winning one for the Swedish music service, and recommitting to free would demonstrate that the service is still interested in the other 88 million.

We reached out to Spotify, but received a “no comment” on the matter. Same for another recent story suggesting that the company is planning to release a standalone in-car player, which surfaced as users began to receive offers for a new piece of Spotify hardware designed to bring the music service to older model cars.