Spotify, the renowned online audio streaming platform, has announced a significant price increase of over 40% for its Premium subscribers. The company stated that this adjustment in the Premium Individual subscription fee is essential to sustain innovation in its product offerings and features, ensuring that users continue to enjoy an optimal experience.
According to a notification, Spotify has informed its users that starting from their November billing date, the subscription cost will escalate from ₦900 per month to ₦1,300 per month. Nonetheless, Spotify has also mentioned that subscribers who prefer not to accept the new pricing for the Premium service have the option to cancel their subscription through their account page.
In tandem with the price hike, Spotify has rolled out a new feature for Premium users worldwide named Offline Backup. This feature enables users to enjoy music offline without the necessity of downloading tracks. Offline Backup becomes accessible in the Home feed when users are offline, have recently listened to more than five songs, and have enabled offline listening.
While Spotify is adjusting its Premium pricing in Nigeria, it has also embarked on a partnership with Orange, a leading telecommunications company in France. This collaboration, initiated in November 2023, offers smartphone users in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Madagascar, and Mali the opportunity to access Spotify music streaming for free.
In a related development, Netflix, another major streaming platform, implemented a price increase for its subscription plans in the Nigerian market in July 2024. This was the second price adjustment within a span of four months, following an initial increase in April 2024. The latest revision saw the Premium subscription plan rise to ₦7,000 ($4.40) monthly from the previous ₦5,000 ($3.14), marking a 40% increase. The April adjustment had earlier raised the Premium Plan from ₦4,400 ($2.76) to ₦5,000 ($3.14).
Additionally, Starlink, an Internet service provider, has recently announced a doubling of its subscription prices in Nigeria as of October 31, 2024. The company cited “excessive levels of inflation” as the reason for this price surge. The standard residential plan, which includes a 1TB fair usage policy, saw an increase from ₦38,000 ($24) to ₦75,000 ($48), while the price for Roaming customers jumped from ₦49,000 to ₦167,000 per month. However, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has faced criticism from stakeholders within the Nigerian telecom sector regarding Starlink’s price increase.
Critics have accused the NCC of exhibiting double standards by permitting Starlink to nearly double its prices, while simultaneously denying requests from local telecom operators to adjust their tariffs in response to escalating operational costs. Stakeholders argue that this disparity is unjust towards local operators who have significantly invested in expanding telecom services across the country, only to find themselves constrained from revising their pricing structures.
