If you have been hooked on streaming music service Spotify for the past six months and have now backed yourself into a corner where you can’t envision your day-to-day life without it, you better get ready to add a $5 bill to your monthly payments.
In just a week, Spotify will turn 6 months old in the U.S., and that will bring on some new limitations.
When it’s over, users who are only singed up for the free version of Spotify will be limited to just 10 hours a month of streaming music. Individual tracks will also carry a 5-play limit per month. The ad-supported free version of the service is about to limit you so much that you’ll be forced to sign up for one of their paid subscriptions.
Those options are the $4.99 Unlimited package that has no advertisements and no time limits on streaming; and the Premium package that has all of this but also offers offline playback and mobile functionality via the Spotify app. The Premium package also boast enhanced sound quality on all tracks as well as exclusive content offers.
According to Business Insider, some users have already began to receive notices that they are about to see some changes. Logging into Spotify also gives you the “upgrade” option in the top right corner that takes you to a page where you can easily switch to a paid subscription.
Here’s a statement from a Spotify spokesperson:
All new Spotify users – both in the US and in all other countries in which Spotify is available – are able to enjoy an unlimited free service for their first six months. As we have previously stated, after a Spotify user has enjoyed free unlimited listening for six months, some changes to the free service will come into effect. We will have more information on these changes in due course. Spotify Premium and Spotify Unlimited remain unaffected.
So new Spotify customers will still be able to access the six-month run of unlimited service for free, but for those who jumped on board right as Spotify came to the States, it looks like the time has come. Will you pay for Spotify Unlimited or Premium? Let us know in the comments.