Music app Spotify hits 100m paid user mark

Music streaming service Spotify has said its paying subscribers have reached 100 million for the first time, up 32% year-on-year and almost twice the latest figures from Apple Music.

The Stockholm-based company called the figure, which was reached during the first three months of 2019, “an important milestone”.

The growth was driven, among other things, by “a better-than-planned promotion in the US and Canada”.

Spotify said it had reached “the high end of our guidance range of 97-100 million”.

By comparison, arch-rival Apple Music had about 50 million paying subscribers at the end of 2018, the latest available figures.

Apple is expected to release new figures with its earnings report on Tuesday.

The number of Spotify’s total monthly users, which includes those who do not pay a monthly subscription fee but use the service with intermittent ads, rose to 217 million in the first quarter.

The strong growth in its user base led to a 33% rise in revenue, to 1.5 billion euros (£1.3 billion).

Yet like many tech companies focusing on building market share, the company continued to lose money, reporting an operating loss of 47 million euros (£40.6 million).

Spotify said that voice speakers such as Google Home and Alexa are a “critical area of growth” and it is looking to invest more in podcasts to supplement its offering of music.