Cord cutting Spotify
Let’s fix the problem of Spotify making too much money while still keeping access to our music.
If you listened to your favorite artist on Spotify like it was a full-time job, you’d spend 2,087 hours a year streaming their music. With songs averaging 3 minutes, that amounts to ~41,740 streams.
Spotify pays artists as little as $0.0029 per stream, so after all that streaming, your favorite artist would earn just $121.05 USD for a full year of your dedication.
Even at this low payout, Spotify is still making a profit. A standard annual individual Spotify Premium subscription costs $143.88 (excluding taxes).
Breaking Down the Numbers
According to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) 2023 report, the average person listens to 20.7 hours of music per week. Over a year, that adds up to 1,076 hours or roughly 21,520 streams.
- You pay $143.88 per year for Spotify Premium.
- The artist payout for those streams is $64.58 total.
- That means only $0.44 of every dollar you spend actually goes to artists—Spotify keeps the rest.
If this seems fair and reasonable to you, then we’re at an impasse—and you should probably stop reading this blog. But if you think artists deserve better, let’s follow the money.
Spotify’s Declining Artist Payouts
In 2017, Spotify paid artists $0.006 per stream. That meant 1 million US streams generated $6,000 for an artist.
Today, the same number of streams would earn just $4,500.
Spotify’s payouts are now among the lowest in the industry despite it being the largest streaming platform.
Meanwhile, in Stockholm…
Did you know Spotify CEO Daniel Ek has made more money than any musician who has ever lived? After his cash out, Ek has made more money than Taylor Swift, Jay-Z, and Rihanna combined. Source: Snopes
So what is Spotify doing with this subscriber money?
Well, for starters…
In January 2025, Spotify donated $150,000 to Donald Trump’s inauguration fund. Source: Pitchfork
Considering that Trump is now a convicted felon and currently ineligible to run again, let’s call this what it is: a bribe.
There’s more to this story but we could stop right there at funding fascist regimes and move on to the real question: Why are people still using Spotify?
Why Quitting Spotify Feels Harder Than It Should
Even if you hate what Spotify is doing, you might not be ready to walkaway. I get it. Music isn’t just background noise—it’s deeply connected to mental health. 71% of people say music is important to their well-being.
Your playlists? You’ve spent years curating them. Walking away feels like abandoning something deeply personal and no one can blame you for wanting to enjoy them a little longer.
So let’s start small; let’s fix the problem of Spotify making too much money while still keeping access to our music.
How to Unf*ck Spotify
Stop Paying Spotify While Keeping Premium Features
Spotify’s free tier is intentionally designed to be unbearable. It uses a technique I call "advertorment" to psychologically torture free users, bullying them to pay for the premium version. I only endured this torment one week but here's my personal observation of the free Spotify user ad experience:
- Long, repetitive ads. If all you need is just a bump of Passion Pit - Sleepyhead, three back-to-back 30 second ads doesn't quite feel worth the time it took from your life to sell you a car you can't afford.
- Forced shuffle mode. As a free subscriber, you will never hear an album the way it was intended to be heard. I don't understand how artists and record companies are okay with this, but I am not.
- Inserted “similar” songs you never asked for. This is a vector of attack for "AI artists" to sling their generated songs to get higher stream counts.
The goal? To bully you into paying for Premium.
But my dear reader, you don’t have to. There’s a workaround.
The SpotX script removes all ads and free-tier restrictions, giving you the full Premium experience for free.
Windows
Linux/MacOS
This script updates your installed version of Spotify to an evaluation version, removing ads and usability restrictions.
Until next time...
Next time we’ll explore truly walking away from Spotify. There are too many better paying alternatives and self-hosting options for us to ignore.
Until then, feel free to share your stories, suggestions, and criticisms on our Discord. Let’s walkaway from bad tech, together.
