Number of artists with millions of payments on Spotify hardly increased in 2022 Torture and executions – that’s the state of the revolution in Iran

The number of artists whose music has generated at least $1 million in payouts on Spotify has grown only slightly over the past year. In 2022, 1,060 artists crossed the line, 20 more than the year before, according to calculations by the music streaming market leader published on Friday. From 2020 to 2021 there was a jump of 180 musicians and bands in this squad. Spotify itself points to an increase of 130 percent compared to 2017.

There was even less movement among the top earners: the number of artists whose recordings and publications led to license payments of at least ten million dollars stagnated at 40. In the previous two years, it had grown by ten each. At the $5 million mark, there were also 130 artists unchanged in 2022 (2020: 100).

Spotify emphasizes that the license payments go to rights holders such as music companies and that the streaming service has no influence on how they are distributed afterwards. Spotify gives nearly 70 percent of subscription and advertising revenue to the music industry. If the income increases, the benefits also increase. As a benchmark, Spotify estimates that, on average, artists derive about a quarter of their revenue from the market leader.

Streaming has become the most important source of income in the music industry in recent years and also ensures constant growth in turnover. Especially at the beginning of the streaming era, some popular musicians had criticized that even with millions of views on online services, they were only making relatively small amounts of money. Spotify points out that in the CD era, most of the revenue flowed in the first week after release. There are now almost 3,000 ‘music legends’ of which 80 percent of the streams are songs older than five years.

Spotify estimates there are about 200,000 professional and aspiring musicians on the platform. License payments of at least $50,000 would have raised 17,800 last year.

Spotify is considered the number one in music streaming. The service, which originated in Sweden, recently had a total of 515 million users, of which 210 million are paying subscription customers. Last year, the company generated a total turnover of 11.73 billion euros. (aeg/sda/dpa)