Spotify facts for kids
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| Type of business | Public (Société Anonyme) |
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| Traded as |
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| Founded | 23 April 2006 |
| Headquarters |
Stockholm, Sweden
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| Country of origin | Sweden |
| No. of locations | 15 offices |
| Founder(s) |
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| Key people | Daniel Ek (Chairman & CEO) |
| Industry |
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| Revenue |  €11.7 billion (2022) |
| Operating income |  €-659 million (2022) |
| Net income | €–430 million (2022) |
| Total assets | €7.6 billion (2022) |
| Total equity | €2.4 billion (2022) |
| Employees | 9,473 (June 2023) |
| Subsidiaries |
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| Website |
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| Registration | Required |
| Users |
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| Launched | 7 October 2008 |
Spotify is a Swedish audio streaming and media services provider founded on 23 April 2006 by Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon. It is one of the largest music streaming service providers, with over 551 million monthly active users, including 220 million paying subscribers, as of June 2023. Spotify is listed (through a Luxembourg City-domiciled holding company, Spotify Technology S.A.) on the New York Stock Exchange in the form of American depositary receipts.
Spotify offers digital copyright restricted recorded audio content, including more than 100 million songs and five million podcasts, from record labels and media companies. As a freemium service, basic features are free with advertisements and limited control, while additional features, such as offline listening and commercial-free listening, are offered via paid subscriptions. Users can search for music based on artist, album, or genre, and can create, edit, and share playlists.
Spotify is available in most of Europe, as well as Africa, the Americas, Asia, and Oceania, with a total availability in 184 markets. Its users and subscribers are based largely in the US and Europe, jointly accounting for around 53% of users and 67% of revenue. It has no presence in mainland China where the market is dominated by QQ Music. The service is available on most devices, including Windows, macOS, and Linux computers, iOS and Android smartphones and tablets, smart home devices such as the Amazon Echo and Google Nest lines of products, and digital media players like Roku.
Unlike physical or download sales, which pay artists a fixed price per song or album sold, Spotify pays royalties based on the number of artist streams as a proportion of total songs streamed. It distributes approximately 70% of its total revenue to rights holders (often record labels), who then pay artists based on individual agreements.
Content
The spotify web page instantly creates a listing of local music files which the user has stored on their computer or other devices. It does not mechanically duplicate or import the listing of music files. If the user prefers not to use the listing utility it can be inactivated in the preferences software application. The files created on the user’s computer can be imported to any device such as a mobile device with the use of the mobile client, or even upload these files to the Spotify Software Application. Users may only import or copy files that they have legally attained, even though the user has the choice to not utilize the Spotify service to import or copy their content that they have downloaded from other sites illegally online.
Images for kids
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Daniel Ek addressing Spotify staff in 2010
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Former Spotify headquarters in Stockholm
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Spotify Desktop Client running on Arch Linux
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Joe Rogan, host of The Joe Rogan Experience
See also
In Spanish: Spotify para niños
