Spotify has made major upgrade in its free mobile app, giving advertising-supported users more control with on-demand music playback. Changes declared on 15 September 2025, marking the long -standing reshuffle of the forum marks only a departure for free listeners.
The first update allows free users to “pick and play” the specific track within any playlist or album tractist. Previously, free mobile users were limited to reshuffle mode, which made the song order random without options to select individual tracks. Now, while the playlists and albums are still default to reshuffle, users can manually choose and play any song on demands from those list. However, on-demand playback has a daily range over minutes, and features such as queuing songs are exclusive to premium customers.
Two additional on-demand features have been added to free users. “Search and Play” allows users to discover individual songs and enables them to active search instead of playing immediately. “Share and Play” allows the track shared through the new direct message feature of the message, social media, or Spotify to be played on mobile devices immediately. It was earlier available only on desktop or tablet versions.
These promotion aims to promote the user's busyness, increase advertising revenue, maintain free users and encourage conversion for paid membership. Spotif's VP of Markets and Subscription, Gustav Gileenhammar described the update as “glitter” for the Freemium model. He said, “By opening and widening the experience for free, we are capable of accelerating the development of our free tier, both of users as well as engagement,” he said.
The decision was partially operated by response from young users, especially General Z, who found the old free mobile experience disappointing. “Young users felt that the old spotify free experience on mobile was almost broken,” Gyllenhammar explained. “They tried to tap on things, and didn't work. The behavior that young users are in their media models today – they really expect it to work.”
For example, with searching and playing, users can now immediately use a new release that they have heard from Ticketok or friends. Gyllenhammar left a new song to Ed Sheeran's fictional: “You can find the name of the song, and you can play that song.” Share and play addresses last annoyance where shared links will not play immediately on free mobile app.
Spotify tested these features in emerging markets for 18 months before the global launch. The results showed improved retention between free users and high conversion rates in premiums. The company noted that 60 percent of its premium customers started on free tier, making these improvements important for long -term development.
Platforms such as YouTube and Tiktok include updates amid growing competition, attracting young audiences with flexible, on-demand materials. Spotify hopes that changes will help competing by aligning modern user expectations.
On the premium side, Spotify introduced a playlist mixing tool and defective audio for recently paid users. These are not a part of a rumor “Super-Merndium” or “Music Pro”, such a plan was suggested despite earlier reports. Bloomberg reported in February 2025 that Spotify was considering the cost of $ 5.99 higher cost ad-on for allowances “superfan” allowances.
Addressing the membership roadmap, Gileenhammar said, “Together with our industry partners, we still have a task to come up with more interesting and exciting products that we can layer at the top of the current membership landscape.” He pointed to the super VIP Tier of Music Entertainment in China, with more than 15 million customers and produces five times the revenue of regular people as a possible model.
These fremium changes also benefit the advertising business of Spotify. Performance is expected to improve with excessive time on platforms with more engaged users and focus on specific songs as well as performance. “We can now have too much performing advertising units for our users,” Gheenhammar said. “Therefore we feel strongly that it should be something that can run quick profitability and revenue creation at a free level from advertisers.”
Spotify's Q2 2025 reflect financial stable development. The premium subscriber reached 276 million, which ranged from 268 million to 8 million Q1. Total monthly active users, including free and payment, hit 696 million, 11 percent year-to-year growth and 18 million more than Q1. Advertising-supported revenue rose to € 453 million ($ 514 million), which increased by 5 percent year-old year based on continuous currency run by music and podcast advertisements.
Last month, Spotify started in-app direct messaging for all users, received mixed reactions. Some praised the social feature, while others criticized it for potential privacy issues or dislocation.
Overall, these updates sign the push of Spotify to develop their free tier, piercing future premium innovations. As mentioned by Gileinhammar, increasing the free experience “another part is why this step is important to us,” a competitive streaming market is to bring the company to position for a continuous increase in the market.
