Spotify For Free? Music Streaming Service Launches Free Ad-Skipping In Australia

Music streaming service Spotify (SPOT) has long offered two basic tiers for its users. Anyone can download and listen to music for free on Spotify, but they have to hear frequent ads between songs. Paid users, on the other hand, get an ad-free experience with the added freedom to skip to the next song on a playlist with no limits.

However, free Spotify users might get a previously unheard of new feature: The ability to skip ads altogether. The streaming service launched a new feature called “Active Media” that is currently exclusive to the Australian market. Australian Spotify users in the free tier can now skip audio and video ads to their hearts’ content, according to Spotify’s branding website.

For users, this is obviously quite beneficial for the listening experience. A user enjoying some music will no longer have to listen to an ad they do not want to hear in order to keep listening.

But there's a catch. When users skip ads, Spotify will use that data to personalize which ads they see in the future.

The streaming service insisted advertisers actually benefit from this, too. They will only have to pay for ads that users sit all the way through. Spotify AUNZ head of sales Andrea Ingham called it a "win-win" for everyone involved.

“At Spotify we’re committed to delivering the best possible free user experience for fans and advertisers,” Ingham said in Spotify’s company statement. “By introducing user choice through Active Media, we’ll be able to learn from each engagement so the personalization of our ads matches the personalization of our top playlists like Discover Weekly and Your Time Capsule.”

Spotify’s statement did not elaborate on whether or not Active Media will spread to the rest of the world, or remain in Australia. Spotify may continue introducing free benefits like this, as it tries to compete with its closest competitor in Apple Music.

Its shares rose by more than six percent over the past five days as of market close on Monday.

Apple Music and Spotify have been in a fierce subscriber battle for market share in the United States. If Spotify continues to make the free-user experience more convenient and packed with features, it could generate more user loyalty in the long run. Apple Music does not have a free listener tier.

Though Spotify still has significantly more paid subscribers around the world than Apple Music, the company is still not making a profit.