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Report: Apple Music customers don’t stream as much as Spotify users … yet

Apple wants us to believe that its Music streaming service is the best thing to happen to the industry since iTunes was launched. If one report is to be believed, things might not be taking off as well as we might expect from an Apple product.

With a product as young as Apple Music, it can be hard to track how well things are going, especially since there are no paying subscribers yet. But, DashGo, a distributor of indie music has been tracking its Apple Music streams versus Spotify and seen quite a difference in the amount of time spent listening to music between either service. Apple Music streams are 1/25th the volume of streams DashGo sees from Spotify.

Of course, there is a huge difference in the number of subscribers. Spotify has over 75 million active users across the globe, while it’s estimated that Apple Music has 10 million so far. Using that ratio, Apple Music users make up around 13% of the streams generated by Spotify listeners.

There are a couple of reasons why it might be this way (apart from Apple Music being a new product). First off, Apple Music isn’t available on Android yet, Spotify is. As we all know, that’s a huge portion of the smartphone market that can’t get hold of Apple’s service yet.

Secondly, DashGo’s CEO Ben Patterson believes it could be because of the way Apple Music is targeted. DashGo itself works mostly with obscure artists, which may not even show up in suggestions or playlists yet. What’s more, with Spotify, it’s easy to find shared playlists with specific artists in them and even easier to create your own. So people’s listening habits may be really different in that regard. With Apple pushing its own playlists, independent and small artists won’t get the same exposure as they might from user-made, shared playlists.

The truth is, no one really has a big picture view on this right now. We don’t have exact numbers and it’s hard to compare when the only information you have is from a very niche source.

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Comments

  1. dorkydirtt - 9 years ago

    I use Spotify because they have a free version with ads.

  2. Walter Tizzano - 9 years ago

    I think Apple will lose a lot of British customers: Apple music it’s way too expensive here.

    • Rodí O'Leary (@RodiOL) - 9 years ago

      ? It’s the same price as Spotify. Plus offers better value with the family package.

      • applegetridofsimandjack - 9 years ago

        Apple’s family plan is truly awesome but Spotify offers more features and a much better app on desktop and mobile.

        Apple Music keeps crashing on my iPad Air 2 and iPhone 6 while Spotify apps are extremely stable. Spotify also offers lyrics, higher quality audio, awesome features on mobile like tap and hold on an album/song to play a random song/part in a song. Spotify also allows users to share playlist and make them collaborative.

        I think Apple Music hasca lot of work to do to catch up with Spotify.

      • Fadi Maha (@FADITWEET) - 9 years ago

        I have been running Apple music everyday for an average of 12 hours a day, since day ONE and it has not crashed once, Rodi. Not once. I think your devices are the issue, not the service.

        Spotify most definitely does NOT offer a better app on desktop and definitely not on mobile.

    • joshblinney - 9 years ago

      What’s that mean. I loved kg Spotify I had a go 5 years of ups and downs music and playlist. But I also brought along of songs over the years and so I stood with apple music and will carry on with apple music. It’s the cheapest for what it come with

  3. epicflyingcat - 9 years ago

    Maybe because probably millions of users (like me) signed up on launch day, tried it for a few days, realised how much worse it was, and switched back.

    • Fadi Maha (@FADITWEET) - 9 years ago

      “Millions” like you, tried and switched back?? Millions? Would love to see your statistics to back this ridiculous claim up. I’ll be here, no rush.

  4. I work in public and private wifi management…
    If I take a random site, the figures for the last month speak for themselves…
    These 3 picked out of a large table, – not 1st 2nd & 3rd (although google was 1st, facebook was second)

    Application downloaded no. of clients
    Google Video 20.86 GB 162
    Apple Music 16.62 GB 359
    Spotify 3.46 GB 15

    • Fadi Maha (@FADITWEET) - 9 years ago

      A little glimpse of a bigger picture, probably happening almost everywhere. A month in and Spotify is already starting to lose ground to Apple Music, even though they had years on them. Good info, Dieter.

  5. 30%, not 13%. (1/25 / (10 million / 75 million) * 100%)

  6. adelesamantha2015 - 9 years ago

    Thanks for the article, Cam. For those who live outside US and want to access Spotify, you can use UnoTelly as I do to get around the geo block.

  7. marcolpz958 - 9 years ago

    Apple Music DOES offers a free version too, without adds