Industry context
March 18, 2021

Over 13,000 artists generating over $50,000 on Spotify per year

Spotify has launched a new website – Loud & Clear – with plenty of information about money generated on the streaming platform. In 2020, some 13,400 acts generated total payments in excess of $50,000 around the world, double the number of artists who generated over $50k in payments from Spotify in 2017 (7,300). Also, L&C shows that 7,800 artists generated $100k-plus in 2020, the $500k-plus-per-year club counted 1,820 artists in 2020, and the $1 million-plus-per-year club counted 870 artists in 2020. Generated is important here - it's the amount made by the artist's music, and that amount is being split by the artist and the publisher, with the big chunk (85% or so) going to the publisher. As of 2020, Spotify has paid over $23 billion in royalties to rights holders — including over $5 billion in 2020 alone, up from $3.3 billion in 2017.