Music streaming giant Spotify announced on Wednesday that it paid a record $10 billion in royalties to the music industry in 2024, marking the largest single-year payout in its history.
In a report, Spotify said the $10bn payout was “the largest in music industry history”, comparing itself to Tower Records at the peak of the CD era in the early 2000s. It reported €1.1bn in net income for the year.
The Swedish company revealed that nearly 1,500 artists earned over $1 million in royalties from the platform last year. Additionally, its total annual royalty payments have surged tenfold from $1 billion in 2014, reflecting the rapid expansion of the streaming economy over the past decade.
“What we’re seeing empirically is way more artists making it than at any other time in music history”, said Sam Duboff, head of marketing and policy for Spotify’s music business, in an interview.
Spotify’s latest financial disclosures come at a time of both growth and legal scrutiny. In 2023, the company faced a lawsuit in the United States alleging that it had underpaid songwriting royalties for tens of millions of tracks. However, the case was dismissed by a federal judge in New York earlier this year.
Despite legal hurdles, Spotify remains the world’s leading music streaming service, with more than 600 million active users globally. The company has continued to expand its dominance in the industry, investing in personalized recommendations, podcasting, and AI-driven music discovery tools.
As streaming continues to reshape the music landscape, industry stakeholders—including artists, labels, and rights holders—will be watching how Spotify’s revenue-sharing model evolves in the coming years.
