Streaming platforms like Spotify pay artists on a pay-per-stream basis. So every time you listen to an artist's song on Spotify, the company pays them a small royalty fee for the privilege.
The Spotify payment model is one that many have criticized in the past. So, how much does Spotify pay per stream?
How Much Does Spotify Pay Per Stream?
According to Business Insider, Spotify pays rights-holders between $0.003 and $0.005 per stream on average. Approximately 70 percent of the total revenue earned per stream goes to the artist, while the rest is absorbed by the platform itself.
The artist's distribution contract with Spotify and their country of residence both influence how much they'll be paid. As will each listener's country of origin and whether they're tuning in from a free Spotify account or from a Spotify Premium account.
Artists can make an average of anywhere from $3,300 to $3,500 per 1 million streams. These figures have fluctuated to some extent in 2020 and 2021, actually rising slightly for the first time since the company was founded in 2006.
Calculating Spotify's Pay-Per-Stream Payments
Like many algorithms, the exact details of Spotify's payment model are closely-guarded secrets. You won't find any of these numbers on its website, but if you're a musician, you can still use a Spotify stream calculator to get an idea of what you could earn from Spotify.
SoundCampaign's Spotify Royalties Calculator is an easy-to-use web app. It factors in your streaming stats, your royalties share, and your listeners' locations, then crunches the numbers for you.
How Much Do Other Streaming Platforms Pay Per Stream?
The Trichordist's Streaming Price Bible for 2019-2020 compared major streaming services and their artist revenue policies, backed by industry data from the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America).
This simplified representation of the streaming industry analyzed the payouts of the top 30 streaming services in 2019-2020, which account for 99.87 percent of every streaming dollar earned online.
The report found that the average pay-per-stream rate across the board fell somewhere around $0.00173. At the time, Apple Music was found to offer artists a rate of about $0.0675 per stream, and Amazon Music was paying out around $0.00426 per stream.
Some of the top-paying streaming platforms included:
- Amazon Unlimited, at $0.01123 per stream
- Facebook, at $0.05705 per stream
- YouTube Red, at $0.01009 per stream
- Peloton, at $0.03107 per stream
- iHeartRadio, at $0.01798 per stream
The lower-paying streaming platforms included:
- YouTube Content ID, at $0.00022 per stream
- VEVO, at $0.00083 per stream
- YouTube, at $0.00154 per stream
- Pandora, at $0.00203 per stream
Some of these numbers are less than encouraging for new artists looking to make money specifically from streaming their music.
How Much Do Artists Make on Spotify?
Not much, truth be told. Except for the big, household names who can rack up millions of streams in hours.
While Spotify, like all streaming services, pays out for every stream, the numbers are quite small for all but the biggest music artists.