Kevin JohnsonSpotify is a Swedish media services company and the world’s leading music streaming platform. The Stockholm-based streaming giant was founded in 2006 by Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon to counter increasing piracy problems in the music industry.
Spotify’s customer base grew to 172 million paying subscribers and 381 million monthly active users. The company had 6,554 employees and generated $9.5 billion in revenues in 2020. [1]
Spotify users can access over 50 million songs, podcasts, and videos from artists globally. The company offers two plans, Spotify Free and Spotify Premium. The free version is ad-supported and accessible via PC, laptop, and mobile phone.
Users need a Spotify Premium subscription to access the full service. With 35% of the global paid streaming subscription market, Spotify is the world’s most popular music streaming service. But the company faces stiff competition from tech giants, such as Apple, Amazon, and Google. [2]
Here is an in-depth analysis of top Spotify’s competitors and alternatives:
1. Apple Music
Year founded: 2015
Headquarter: Cupertino, California
Apple Music is a streaming service owned by Apple Inc. Users can stream music and videos or save content using connected devices. As a subsidiary of the world’s most valuable brand, Apple Music has enough resources to challenge Spotify. In 2021, Apple’s annual revenue was $365 billion with $94 billion in profits.
Apple Music and Spotify are the two most popular music streaming platforms. Both require a $10 monthly subscription fee. But Apple Music offers lossless and spatial audio support.
Apple Music users can combine user-owned songs with Apple’s streaming catalog. They can also use AI assistant Siri for efficient voice control for playback. Apple Music is Spotify’s top competitor for many reasons. [3]
2. Amazon Music
Year founded: 2007
Headquarter: Seattle, Washington
Amazon Music is a music streaming service offered by global eCommerce giant Amazon. Like Spotify, Amazon Music provides apps for iPhones, Android smartphones, PC, and several media players. So, users can stream music on a variety of devices. In 2021, Amazon had over 1,622,000 employees and generated $469 billion in revenues.
Amazon Music is one of the top three players in the music streaming service globally. Amazon Music and Spotify both have around 75 million songs on their platforms. But this platform offers a lossless listening experience, higher fidelity tracks at no extra charge, and perks for Amazon Prime members.
Additionally, Amazon Music costs $8 versus $10 for Spotify. As the first online music store, Amazon has more experience in this sector than Spotify. [4]
3. YouTube Music
Year founded: 2015
Headquarter: San Bruno, California
YouTube Music is part of Google’s YouTube, the most popular free video platform. This music streaming platform allows users to browse and listen to different music genres in audio and video. With over 50 million users,
YouTube Music is a worthy competitor for Spotify. In 2021, YouTube generated $28.8 billion in revenue. The platform employs around 5,000 people. [5]
In Dec 2020, Google discontinued Google Play Music and merged it with YouTube Music. This merger increased YouTube’s content overnight. As a result, YouTube Music added more than 20 million subscribers in 2021 from 30 million reported in Dec 2020.
The platform paid out $4 billion to content creators, surpassing Spotify. Like Spotify, YouTube Music offers a free plan and tens of millions of songs. But Spotify limits users’ options to the songs on specific playlists, such as Daily Mix. YouTube Music is the best Spotify alternative for free music streaming. [6]
4. Pandora
Year founded: 2000
Headquarter: Oakland, California
Pandora is an audio streaming platform that offers music and podcasts. In 2018, SiriusXM acquired Pandora for $3.5 billion. This merger elevated Pandora’s status to one of the world’s top streaming giants.
Podcast and Spotify offer millions of podcasts and allow users to save them for later. Both services provide podcast-specific playback features, such as forward and backward skipping.
Like Spotify, Pandora offers an ad-supported free plan and four paid plans ranging from Pandora Plus for $4.99/m to Pandora Premium Family for $14.99/m.
Its pricing model is similar to Spotify across the board. However, Spotify has a comprehensive music library with new and more popular songs than Pandora. With 63.5 million monthly active users, Pandora is a worthy competitor for Spotify. [7]
5. Deezer Music
Year founded: 2007
Headquarter: Paris, France
Deezer is an audio streaming service that allows users to listen to podcasts and music. The platform offers music content from record labels like Universal Music Group, Warner Music Group, and Sony Music. With 823 employees and $190 million in revenues, Deezer still has a long way to go to catch up to Spotify.
Deezer and Spotify stream music and podcasts, with a library of over 70 million songs each. Unlike Spotify, Deezer offers a HiFi plan with high-quality FLAC audio files of 1,411kbps.
With 16 million subscribers from over 180 countries, Deezer has about a tenth of Spotify’s subscriber base. But Deezer’s unique offering can poach some customers from Spotify. [8]
6. SoundCloud
Year founded: 2007
Headquarter: Berlin, Germany
SoundCloud is an online music sharing and distribution platform. Its users can upload, promote, share, and stream audio content. SoundCloud has gross revenue of over $200 million. The company has around 425 employees.
SoundCloud operates as a social networking platform. As of Mar 2021, the platform had over 30 million creators and more than 265 million tracks.
Like Spotify, SoundCloud offers free and paid plans. But SoundCloud allows anyone to upload and share music on the platform. This flexible approach makes SoundCloud enticing for independent artists. [9]
7. Napster
Year founded: 1999
Headquarter: Seattle, Washington
Formerly known as Rhapsody, Napster offers a music file delivery service. It was the first peer-to-peer (P2P) music sharing platform and was digitized after merging with Rhapsody. The company has 200 employees, 3 million paying subscribers, and annual revenue of $106.3 million.
Napster currently offers two subscription plans, unRadio for $4.99 per month and Premier for $9.99 per month. In Aug 2020, Melody VR acquired Napster for $70 million. This acquisition increases Napster’s competitive edge over Spotify. [10]
8. Tidal
Year founded: 2014
Headquarter: Malmö, Sweden
Tidal is a subscription service that offers high-resolution music and movies in 54 countries. The platform pays a considerable portion of royalties to the artists. With 305 employees and $147 million in annual revenues, Tidal is a dwarf compared to Spotify.
Tidal offers two paid subscriptions, Premium and HiFi. Although it doesn’t have a free plan like Spotify, Tidal features music from the best upcoming artists. Users get access to exclusive music released by new artists months before the rest of the world.
Tidal offers over 60 million tracks, about 10 million more than Spotify’s catalog. The platform also features over 250,000 full-length films, documentaries, and music concerts. Tidal’s comprehensive audio library makes it appealing for users and one of the best Spotify alternatives. [11]
9. Bandcamp
Year founded: 2008
Headquarter: Oakland, California
Bandcamp is a streaming platform that focuses on albums or any other format. It is the perfect opposite of Spotify, enticing music lovers who seek something different. Currently, Bandcamp employs around 200 people and features 600,000 albums from 183 countries.
Unlike Spotify, Bandcamp is profitable. Why? Bandcamp stands out from the crowd. It operates on a simple revenue share with artists, 15% of sales, and an additional 10% for artists with over $5,000 in revenue.
The platform allows artists to choose their own prices and doesn’t collect information on its users. Spotify works with a few distributors, while Bandcamp is open to anyone. These differences increase Bandcamp’s appeal over Spotify. [12]
10. JioSaavn
Year founded: 2018
Headquarter: Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
JioSaavn is the world’s leading online music streaming service and distributor of regional Indian music. The platform makes around $9.2 million in revenues annually. With over 100 million subscribers, JioSaavn is a powerhouse in its own right.
Users can access JioSaavn Pro for only $4.99 per month, half the price of Spotify’s Premium. The app offers an HD audio experience and access to a collection of more than 45 million tracks. Users can download unlimited songs offline.
In 2018, JioSaavn officially merged with Indian telecom giant Reliance Jio. This merger transformed JioSaavn into a global live-streaming app for regional Indian music. With over 40 million Bollywood songs, JioSaavn has a significant edge over Spotify. [13]
11. ByteDance
Year founded: 2016
Headquarter: Beijing, China
ByteDance is a Chinese entertainment giant that owns Resso, a music streaming app. Resso is one of Spotify’s top three competitors in India. The platform’s monthly active users grew by 599% from Aug 2020 to Aug 2021. [14]
ByteDance also owns TikTok, a video-focused social networking service with 800 million monthly active users. According to a 2021 MRC Data study, 75% of TikTok users discovered new artists and music on the platform. TikTok enables music discovery for around 600 million users, about 250 million more than Spotify’s total number of users.
TikTok is the best Spotify alternative for music discovery. In 2020, TikTok’s revenue increased by more than 500%, from $350 million in 2019 to $1.9 billion. With Resso and TikTok, ByteDance can challenge Spotify on multiple fronts. [15]
12. Qobuz
Year founded: 2007
Headquarter: Pantin, France
Qobuz is a music streaming and downloading service available in France, the UK, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, and Spain. In 2019, Qobuz expanded into the US – Spotify’s top market. Qobuz has more than 200,000 subscribers and offers two paid plans.
Although Qobuz doesn’t provide as many songs as Spotify, it has a comprehensive mix of avant-garde tracks and albums. It is the first platform to offer “Hi-Res” (high-resolution). However, not all songs are available on Hi-Res. Qobuz’s unique offering makes it a worthy competitor for Spotify. [16]
13. Gaana
Year founded: 2010
Headquarter: Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India
Gaana is a commercial music streaming service launched by Times Internet. The platform offers unlimited access to over 30 million songs in 21 Indian languages, including Odia and Tamil. The company has 120 employees and makes over $4 million annually in revenues.
Gaana users can stream over 45 million songs in high-quality HD and access thousands of playlists created by experts. Like Spotify, Gaana offers podcasts covering different topics. The company recently launched Gaana Originals, a platform that promotes content from independent musicians. With over 200 million monthly users, Gaana is one of the top Spotify alternatives in India. [17]
14. Anghami
Year founded: 2012
Headquarter: Abu Dhabi, UAE
Anghami is a music streaming service that offers Arab content. By 2020, Anghami had delivered over 10 billion music streams. According to stats, the MENA music streaming market is expected to grow by over 21% from 2020 to 2027 versus 17.8% globally. Anghami is perfectly positioned to exploit the region’s higher growth rate than Spotify.
The company was founded in Lebanon but relocated to the UAE through a partnership with Abu Dhabi Investment Office (ADIO). The move is part of ADIO’s $545 million Innovation Program that includes setting up the Anghami R&D center in Abu Dhabi. This partnership increases Anghami’s competitive edge. [18]
15. Mixcloud
Year founded: 2008
Headquarter: London, UK
Mixcloud is a British online music streaming and distribution service. The platform allows users to listen to radio shows and DJ mixes. Like Spotify, Mixcloud offers a wide variety of podcasts. The company has raised millions in funding and attracts around 10 million unique listeners per month.
Unlike Spotify, Mixcloud provides crowdsourced content from registered users. The platform introduces about four hours of content per minute and supports more than 1,000 hours of music per day. Over 1 million audio creators use Mixcloud, with around 12 million DJ sets uploaded to the platform by 2019. Mixcloud is the best Spotify alternative for mix-tape designers and DJs. [19]
16. 8Tracks
Year founded: 2008
Headquarter: Toronto, Canada
8tracks (infinitetracks.com) is an online radio and social networking website. The site allows users to create their own mixes or stream user-curated playlists consisting of at least 8 tracks. This straightforward concept is enticing for millions of social media users.
Between 2012 and 2015, 8tracks was more popular than Spotify. At its peak, the platform attracted over 8 million users per month.
The site’s popularity got the attention of tech giants like Google. The company raised $2 million in 2016 and turned profitable in 2018. However, 8tracks lost some of its customers to Spotify and other competitors in the past 2 years. [20]
17. Wynk
Year founded: 2014
Headquarter: Delhi, India
Wynk is a music streaming platform created by telecom giant Airtel. The platform allows users to browse, search, stream and download music. Users can access more than 1.7 million songs under several genres and multiple languages, such as Hindi, English, Punjabi, Telugu, and Tamil. Wynk generates revenue through ads and in-app purchases.
According to FICCI, around 200 million Indians streamed music online per month. Wynk aims to exploit India’s fast-growing market by leveraging the creator economy and podcasts. The company bets on this strategy to attain profitability. With Airtel’s resources, Wynk can challenge Spotify. [21]
18. Noice
Year founded: 2018
Headquarter: Jakarta, Indonesian
Noice is an Indonesian audio streaming service that offers music and podcasts. The platform is part of the Mahaka Media Group, a radio station network. In 2019, the operator expanded Noice online radio by adding music and podcasts.
Noice was developing and streaming more podcasts than other content. Noice creates its podcasts in-house focused on comedy and horror, while Spotify relies on podcast content creators in Indonesia. This hyperlocal content strategy increases Noice’s competitive edge over Spotify in Indonesia. [22]
19. iHeartRadio
Year founded: 2008
Headquarter: New York, NY
iHeartRadio is a freemium podcast and streaming radio platform that operates under iHeartMedia. Like Spotify, iHeartRadio offers a wide selection of podcasts and curated music playlists. In 2021, Dua Lipa’s “Levitating” was the most-played song on iHeartRadio’s stations, with an audience of nearly 1.2 billion in the US.
The main competitive advantage for iHeartRadio is live radio. Users can live-stream several radio stations, news, talk shows, and sports events via iHeartRadio Android or iOS mobile apps. The platform has lost some customers to competitors like Spotify over the years. [23]
20. Musique
Year founded: 2014
Headquarter: France
Musique is a music player that unclutters users’ music-listening experience. Its innovative user interface eliminates distractions and enhances browsing accuracy with pictures of artists and album covers.
The main competitive advantage for Musique is its user-friendly UI. Its interface displays the song lyrics in the Info View, hiding everything unrelated to the track. Users can organize music folders and files to improve their browsing experience. Musique also simplifies queueing with a drag-and-drop feature. [24]
References & more information
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- Willings, A. (2021, Feb 15). What is Spotify, and how does it work? Pocket-Lint
- Lexy, S. (2021, Sep 25). Apple Music vs. Spotify: Comparing the top music streaming services. CNET
- Blanchet, B. (2021, Aug 2). Amazon Music and Spotify offer a huge selection of songs. Business Insider
- Clark, M. (2021, Sep 2). YouTube reports having 50 million Premium and Music subscribers. The Verge
- Rutnik, M. (2021, Dec 1). YouTube Music vs. Spotify: Can Google even compete? Android Authority
- Carbone, S. (2021, Jul 12). Spotify vs. Pandora. Sound Guys
- Rutnik, M. (2021, Dec 12). Spotify vs. Deezer: Can David take on Goliath? Android Authority
- Newman, T. (2021, Jul 12). SoundCloud vs. Spotify. Route Note
- Davis, C. (2021, Jul 13). Napster vs. Spotify: Which One Is the Better Option for You? Aud Free
- Carbone, S. (2021, Nov 17). Tidal HiFi Plus vs. Spotify. Sound Guys
- Krukowski, D. (2021, Aug 19). A Tale of Two Ecosystems: On Bandcamp, Spotify, and the Wide-Open Future. NPR
- GK Writers (2020, Dec 24). Advertising in JioSaavn Music App. Group Knots
- Bhatt, S. (2021, Oct 28). Meet Resso, TikTok’s sister app blazing the music charts. Live Mint
- Houghton, B. (2021, Jul 22). TikTok is a powerful music discovery platform than Spotify. Hyper Bot
- Hartzog, O. (2021, Jun). Is Qobuz Worth It? Rolling Stone
- Johnson, C. (2021, Feb 5). Gaana Music Review. Music Gateway
- ITP (2021, Jan 27). Music streaming service Anghami sets up HQ, an R&D hub in Abu Dhabi. Arabian Business
- DJ Tech (2021, Dec 8). Soundcloud vs. Mixcloud: Who Rules Supreme in 2022? DJ Tech Reviews
- Mehta, I. (2020, Sep 7). 8tracks wants to become your favorite place to discover new music all over again. The Next Web
- Lidhoo, P. (2021, Apr 6). Consolidation inevitable in music streaming: Wynk. Fortune India
- Silviana, C. (2021, Apr 15). Indonesian audio app Noice readies to take on Spotify. Deal Street Asia
- Aswad, J. (2021, Nov 29). Dua Lipa’s ‘Levitating,’ Ariana Grande Top iHeartRadio’s Most-Played Lists of 2021. Variety
- Mac Reviews (2021, Jan 11). Musique Overview. Mac Update
- Featured image by Thibault Penin
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Ava Abbott
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