A monthlong bug that offered ads to Spotify Premium subscribers is now resolved, in line with Spotify help. This isn’t the primary time that Spotify has introduced a repair for this bug, so I counsel that you just maintain off on celebrating for at the least a pair days.

Second Time’s the Attraction, Perhaps

Spotify Premium is, after all, an ad-free membership tier. However a surprisingly massive group of Premium subscribers discovered that their music feed was inundated by adverts on February fifth. They rapidly flooded the Spotify Community forums with bugs reviews and screenshots. One week later, Spotify deemed that the issue was resolved—nah, it wasn’t. The designated four-page-long help thread ballooned as increasingly more individuals shared their woes. The thread, on the time of writing, is 92 pages lengthy and 29 days outdated.

Affected customers have been instructed to log out and in of the Spotify app two or thrice to “pressure a resync,” which apparently labored for some customers however not others. Oddly, Spotify tells TechCrunch that the continuing Premium bug is totally different from the one which was patched in February—this data was supplied to TechCrunch just a few hours earlier than Spotify pushed a patch for the newer bug.

So, now we’re left to attend and see what occurs. I think that it will take just a few days to get an correct grasp of the scenario, as Spotify nonetheless means that affected customers “log off of the app and again in once more 2-3 occasions in a row.” Even when the issue is admittedly mounted, we’ll in all probability proceed to see bug reviews from individuals who have not carried out the login-logout dance.

We aren’t positive what number of Spotify prospects have been affected by the Premium bug. It seems to be fairly indiscriminate—Spotify’s help thread is filled with desktop, cellular, and good house customers from world wide. Some complaints come from Premium Household subscribers, too, that means that the issue is not relegated to Spotify’s particular person plan.

Nevertheless, I’ve seen that plenty of customers’ bug reviews focus on good audio system, equivalent to Amazon Echo, Google Nest, and Sonos. Eradicating your Spotify account out of your good gadgets could also be a mandatory step in forcing a resync (though I truthfully don’t know what a resync entails on this context). It is also value noting that some podcasts aren’t ad-free, even with a Premium account.

Remind Me, How A lot Am I Paying for Premium?

Spotify elevated its costs for the primary time in July 2023. But it surely was a reasonably gentle value hike. The Premium plan, which sat at $9.99 for therefore a few years, jumped to $10.99.

A subsequent value hike in July 2024 knocked the month-to-month payment to $11.99. Spotify would not provide annual memberships (except you buy a gift card, for some cause), so the yearly value of a Premium membership is successfully $143.88. That is some huge cash to pay for a service that, from February fifth to March sixth, struggled to meet the ad-free obligation that Premium prospects deserve.

And if the final two years of value hikes are any indication, Spotify might increase its costs once more this July. If it is one other $1 improve, Premium will price $155.88 every year.

In case you have been affected by the Spotify Premium bug, I strongly counsel that you just reach out to the company’s support channels for some type of restitution. And as a longtime Spotify person myself, I hope that prospects preserve this bug in thoughts as we strategy July. I definitely will.

For these questioning, Apple Music at present prices $10.99 a month. Tidal and YouTube Music are the identical value as Apple Music, whereas Deezer is $11.99. If you wish to present direct monetary help for musicians and truly personal the music you pay for, use BandCamp.

Supply: Spotify