What is the most streamed album in the history of Spotify?
When Daniel Ek ambitiously founded Spotify in 2006, he had big dreams about what the platform could become. Since then, it has single-handedly changed how the music industry works and is now used daily by hundreds of millions of people across the globe.
As of 2023, the streaming giant is used by over 500million people worldwide, with over 200m people paying a monthly subscription fee. Last year, their revenue was around $11billion, demonstrating their chokehold in the music business. Although most artists struggle to pay rent from their royalty cheques, Spotify’s revenue continues to grow annually.
Most artists feel they are treading unjustly by the streaming platform, which reportedly only pays $0.004 per stream. According to a recent study, 75% of those who pay to promote their music spend more than their revenue from streaming and sales in advertising.
Understandably, artists are fuming with the state of affairs, and in 2021, another study stated that only 720 British musicians can afford to make a living solely from streaming royalties. However, there are a few artists who are earning ridiculously high fees from the streamer and earn multi-millionaires fees on an annual basis.
Artists roughly earn $4,000 per million streams, which does sound dramatically low considering how much they made in previous eras from record sales. However, several highly successful artists still earn eye-watering figures comparable to the golden age.
As of writing, Puerto Rican rap sensation Bad Bunny gains more than 50million streams per day on the platform. A sizeable portion of that figure is down to his 2022 album Un Verano Sin Ti, which has earned 13.6billion streams since its release.
The success of Un Verano Sin Ti marginally places Bunny ahead of Ed Sheeran’s 2017 LP ÷, but it has been out for five years fewer, suggesting the gaps between the two records will only expand as time advances.
Typically, the most prominent artists in the world sing in English, but Bad Bunny has stayed loyal to his Latin tongue and reaped the rewards for doing so. Even though most people in the Western world don’t speak Spanish, he’s headlined Coachella and can play in stadiums wherever he chooses without having to perform in a different language to his own.
Speaking about his rise with Harpers Bazaar, Bunny said: “[This is all] for more than just myself, but also for the fans and for all of the Latinos in the world. I get emotional thinking about it … and I see it from the outside. If it wasn’t me, but it was another artist, I would feel just as proud for them too. But obviously, it’s more exciting that it is me.”
If Spotify pays Bad Bunny $0.004 per stream, he’ll have pocketed $54,400,000 from Un Verano Sin Ti since its release in 2022. Although the majority of artists don’t earn a living wage from the streaming service, the world’s biggest stars are making more than ever. Although Spotify claims to have democratised the music industry, the numbers paint a vastly different picture.
