After our decade-long relationship, I’m breaking up with Spotify.
It’s nothing personal. It’s just that Spotify and I have grown up, but we haven’t grown together.
Over the years, I’ve been tempted to leave Spotify many times. I know that the company faces accusations of poor streaming payouts for artists, compared to its competitors, and I haven’t forgotten that it was Spotify that platformed Joe Rogan’s podcast, then exclusive to the platform, to spread misinformation about COVID-19 and other viruses.
I know that Spotify is trying to kill the RSS feed, a move that siphons independence from podcasters. And yet, I’m embarrassed to say that until recently, these issues didn’t move me enough to take the time and energy to investigate alternatives to Spotify, a platform that I’ve been using daily since high school.
It’s unfortunately easy for us to bury our heads in the sand when the tech companies we pay monthly do things that disappoint us. (Yes, I still remember when Netflix laid off my industry colleagues, but I also know I’ll end up watching the new season of “Love is Blind”).
We don’t feel like our one subscription makes a difference — after all, Duolingo still beat revenue estimates after sparking backlash when it said it would replace contractors with AI.
But Spotify finally got to me in a way that’s unavoidable: when I open the app, I cannot bear its all-encompassing, suffocating reliance on algorithmic recommendations.
There’s an overwhelming display of visual clutter from the time it takes to navigate from Spotify’s home page to the music you’re looking for. These suggestions are front-and-center when you open the app.
First, I may see an unsolicited, full-screen pop-up promoting a new podcast. Then, I’m greeted with a 2-by-4 grid of music and podcast suggestions, including new episodes of shows I listened to once because they had a guest I liked, plus some other albums that I’ve dabbled in briefly over the last month or so. Below that, there’s a sponsored recommendation for a song I might like by an artist that I have never heard of. When I navigate to the search tab, I’m prompted with an audiobook recommendation, and if I scroll a little bit, I see vertical video clips that look like they belong on TikTok.
It’s easy to fall into Spotify’s recommendations, as the app constantly pelts you with customized playlists that its AI has curated specifically for you. On Spotify, you never have to make any decisions — and for some listeners, maybe that’s the point. But I noticed that I stopped listening to the music I actually wanted to listen to, and instead, I embraced the music that Spotify told me I wanted to listen to.
Without realizing it, I gave up my agency.
This isn’t to say that my moral qualms with Spotify didn’t influence my choice.
According to a January report from the music financing platform Duetti, Spotify, a company worth about $140 billion, pays about $3 per 1,000 streams. Amazon Music, Apple Music, and YouTube paid $8.80, $6.20, and $4.80, respectively, per 1,000 streams in 2024. (Spotify previously disputed the accuracy of these figures)
Spotify further alienated a portion of its audience in June, when CEO Daniel Ek announced that his investment firm led a nearly $700 million funding round for a company making AI-enabled military weapons. Some bands like Deerhoof, Xiu Xiu, and King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard pulled their catalogs from Spotify in protest.
It’s like deja vu. In 2022, Joni Mitchell and Neil Young pulled their music from Spotify over Joe Rogan’s platforming of medical misinformation. (The two artists returned to the platform in 2024.)
Perhaps it’s taken me so long to leave Spotify because choosing a streaming platform leaves you between a rock and a hard place. But if you’re attached to your years of playlists, tools like Soundiiz make it easy to port your collection between platforms.
I chose Apple Music, mostly because I got a new iPhone and it came with a three-month free trial, which helped me ease my transition. Also, Apple Music has lossless audio, which Spotify has been promising for nearly five years.
But I cannot tell you with a straight face that I have departed big, bad Spotify to support the little guy, when I’ve opted for another tech giant.
I have my ethical concerns around Apple, too — even as I type this on my Magic Keyboard that’s connected to my MacBook Pro while my iPhone, AirPods, and Apple Watch sit on the other side of my desk.
Plus, Apple CEO Tim Cook recently showed up at the White House to gift Donald Trump with a custom, Apple-branded plaque, which sits atop a 24-karat gold base, while performing his fiduciary duty to shareholders to keep Apple products tariff-free.
At least the Apple Music app isn’t as overwhelming as Spotify.
