Spotify price increase: Can you beat the 2024 hike?

Spotify Premium is going up for the second time in a year. Other tiers increase too.

Get ready to pay more for ad-free listening on Spotify, with at least an extra quid added to most plans from May 2024, though existing users should get another month or two at the current prices.

Here’s how much you can expect to pay, ways to save money and alternatives.

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New Spotify prices

On 9 April 2024, Spotify announced a series of price increases. These apply straight away to new customers or anyone changing their plans.

PLAN	CURRENT PRICE	NEW PRICE	% increase
Premium	£10.99	£11.99	9.1% (+£1)
Duo	£14.99	£16.99	13.3% (+£2)
Family	£17.99	£19.99	11.1% (+£2)
Student	£5.99	No change	0%

One month price freeze for existing customers

The announcement by Spotify promised existing subscribers would get one more month at the current prices. The new charges will therefore come in to play from mid May or early June – depending on when you pay your bill.

For example, my Family pass renews in a couple of weeks, so I’ll get another month at £17.99. But when it renews again in May, I’ll pay the higher £19.99.

However, if you’ve just paid in the last few days you won’t actually pay the higher price until your bill in June.

Duo and Family plan increases larger than last time

This is the second increase in 10 months for Spotify Premium (though that hike was the first ever increase). Again it’s another £1 added, so in the space of a year it’s moved from £9.99 a month to £11.99.

But it’s the third jump in three years for anyone on Duo and Family, and those increases are much larger, with £2 added to each one in this change. It means that since April 2021, Family has increased by £5 a month (so £60 a year), and and Duo by £4 a month (£48 a year).

There’s no change though for Student Spotify, which last increased by £1 in 2021.

Can you beat the price hike?

Buy discounted gift cards – save up to £88

Unlike some streaming services, there’s no annual plan to lock in prices. However, there are multi-month gift cards available for the individual Spotify Premium.

Though these are billed as “3 months” or “a year”, they still have a value based on the old £9.99 monthly fee. However, Spotify say that these can still be redeemed even if bought at a lower price.

I thought these would have disappeared since last year’s hike but they’re still on sale, for now at least.

If you are happy to commit to one year, this latest increase means you’ll save even more, with a £43.89 discount (effectively 12 months for the price of 8 and a quarter). That’s just over a third off.

They’ll also only last 12 months from purchase, but they can be added to existing accounts as long as there’s not already more than six months of previous credit added.

So buy two of these now for £198 and you’re saving close to £88 over two years.

Sadly they won’t work on other tiers such as Duo and Family.

Share your account

Despite the prices going up on all the different options, the Duo and Family plans are still cheaper than solo accounts – if you live in the same household as the person you are sharing with.

Plan	1 person	2 people	3 people	4 people	5 people	6 people
Premium	£11.99 (£143.88)	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Duo	£16.99 (£203.88)	£8.50 (£101.94)	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Family	£19.99 (£239.88)	£10 (£120)	£6.66 (£80)	£5 (£60)	£4 (£48)	£3.33 (£40)

Duo is, as the name suggests, for two people. This new price works out as £8.50 per person. That’s an annual saving of £84, or £42 per person versus buying your own Premium memberships.

Though you’d save £2 each in a year if you went via the gift card hack above, doing so will lock you in for a full year. With Duo you’lll have the flexibility to take a break or change your plan.

Family is for up to six different accounts. At £19.99, that’s £6.66 each if there are three of you, down to £3.33 for six. Over a year, six people would each save £104. Combined that’s more than £620!

With both you get your own personal Spotify account, so you don’t get anyone messing with your algorithm. You can even add other’s existing accounts so they keep their existing playlists and log in details.

However they are all paid for by the lead account which means you’ll need to work out how or if you split the bill.

Listen for free

If you are happy with adverts you can use listen to Spotify Free. However you won’t be able to download music to listen to offline or use with a smart speaker.

Alternatives to Spotify

If you aren’t keen on paying more, then you could use this as an opportunity to try a different streaming service. The prices are broadly the same for each service, but if you’re a new customer there are always free trials available.

The length of these vary throughout the year, but it’s usually possible to get at least a month of Tidal, Amazon Music Unlimited, Apple Music and Deezer.

We’ve listed the best offers on our dedicated music streaming deals page.