Spotify to unveil Supremium, its highest subscription yet, offering high-fidelity audio

Music streaming platform Spotify is planning a higher and more expensive subscription option than the premium subscription which is the highest currently. The new package is to be called ‘Supremium’ and is expected to include high-fidelity audio, Bloomberg News reports.

The new tier, called “Supremium” internally, will be the company’s most expensive plan as it aims to drive more revenue and placate investors who have been urging the Swedish company to raise prices. It will also further help it compete with major competitors like Apple Music and Amazon Music, both of which already offer high-fidelity audio.

The new development is coming after the streaming platform first announced the HiFi feature, which upgrades the sound quality of the songs to “lossless” CD-quality music, in 2021.

Also, to augment its current premium tier, Spotify will give subscribers expanded access to audiobooks, either through a specific number of hours free per month or a specific number of titles, the report said.

The company is planning to launch the “Supremium” plan in non-US markets first. This is envisaged to happen anytime from now. However, the US launch would likely take place in October if things go well in other markets.

The more expensive plan won’t necessarily boost the number of subscribers, but it will raise average revenue per user and benefit those who wish to hear Spotify’s lossless music. Spotify is, however, yet to release any official statement confirming this. the company’s shares rose 0.6% to $161 in pre-market trading on Tuesday.

Read also: Spotify surpasses 500 million monthly active users for the first time

More on the new Spotify Tier

Last October, a Reddit user noted that they were surveyed about a “Platinum tier” subscription costing $19.99 per month. The new tier included access to HiFi music, a headphone tuner, and limited-ad podcast listening along with some additional features for playlist management and libraries.

“The company first announced the HiFi tier back in 2021. But the launch has been delayed. Last year, CEO Daniel Ek hinted that the launch was pushed due to licensing issues.”

Soon after Spotify’s announcement, its major competitor, Apple introduced support for lossless music to Apple Music without additional cost in May 2021. At the same time, Amazon also made a move to upgrade its Amazon Prime Music subscription to include access to HiFi music.

Last year, Apple Music raised its subscription fees from $9.99 to $10.99 per month. Earlier this year, Amazon also made a similar change to its Amazon Music Unlimited personal plan. On the other hand, Spotify still offers its premium plan at $9.99 per month — but the company raised its base subscription price in some international markets.

Earlier this year, the streaming giant made some changes at the executive level and sacked some staff members to reduce costs as the economic downturn deepened. According to a note from the company’s CEO and Co-founder, Daniel Ek, Spotify’s current trajectory was unsustainable in the long run.

According to its Q3 of 2022 report, Spotify had 195 million paid subscribers, up from 188 million paid/premium subscribers in Q2 and above its expectations. However, the music streaming platform’s revenue growth rate of 36% in 2018 declined to 3.7% in 2022.

At the end of 2022, its stock also fell to about 70%. This is below some other tech companies’ stocks. But it wasn’t alone in this as Meta also went down to about 65%, Snap to about 81%, and Netflix to about 53%, according to a report by Digital Music News.

During its Q1 2023 earnings call, Spotify announced that it has more than 500 million monthly active users and over 210 million premium subscribers.

Read also: Spotify removes thousands of AI-generated songs to block bots posing as listeners