 "Music streaming giant Spotify now has 158 million paid subscribers globally")
Swedish music streaming giant Spotify announced on Wednesday that it has now 158 million paid subscribers and 208 million are using the ad-supported version globally.
Announcing its financial results for the first quarter of 2021, the company said that its Premium Subscribers grew 21 per cent Year-on-Year (YoY) to 158 million in the quarter.
The company added nearly 4 million subscribers in the first quarter, which drove healthy double-digit YoY growth across all regions.
"I am pleased with the continuing momentum we are seeing across many aspects of our business this quarter, including our subscriber growth," Daniel Ek, CEO and Founder, Spotify, said in a statement.
Spotify said that it added a further 11 million users in the last three months, bringing its total user figure to 356 million.
"Total monthly active users (MAUs) grew 24 per cent YoY to 356 million in the quarter, finishing within our guidance range but modestly below our internal expectations," the company said.
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"In Q1, we added 11 million MAUs, which drove healthy double-digit YoY growth across all regions. We saw meaningful contributions from markets such as the US, Mexico, Russia and India," it added.
The company, however, said that the growth was lower than planned in Latin America and Europe.
On the other hand, in Latin America, Spotify saw outperformance driven by the continued success of its Family Plan product.
The music streaming giant also mentioned that they are pleased with the new market contributions, with South Korea being the biggest driver.
Spotify has announced a lot of services over the past few weeks, which includes 'Car Thing' -- a new smart accessory with a display for a car that lets users listen to everything available on Spotify without using their phone.
Following Apple's announcement of paid subscription podcasts, the company on Tuesday announced a paid subscription platform for podcasters in the US.
The company said that it plans to expand the newly launched service in other regions in the coming months.
--IANS
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