Most music streaming services including Spotify, Apple Music, and recent entrant Resso have aggressively priced their premium subscriptions in India, charging less than $2 a month. It's a close race between Spotify Premium and Apple Music, but Spotify wins as the best music streaming service overall thanks to a fun, easy-to-use interface, an extensive catalog and the best.
Highlights:
- Spotify officially launched in India.
- It offers free and premium subscription plans to users.
- Here’s how the two tiers compare.
Spotify has finally officially launched its services in India and it comes in both, free and premium, plans. The service can now be used in the country as a web app, desktop app, on iOS and Android devices without needing a VPN. The company has also priced it competitively as it starts at almost the same price as Apple Music, at Rs 119 per month, for users who have never opted for Spotify Premium previously, but what extra do you get when going for the premium account subscription over the free one? Which one would suit you better? These are some of the questions one will find answers to in this article, along with some more information on the newly launched online music streaming service.
Spotify Free VS Spotify Premium
Same as many other music streaming services in India, Spotify also enables users to create a free account to stream music from. There is no charge levied on free account holders, however, one will encounter ads between songs. Ads are a basic way for any music streaming service to generate revenue and free Spotify users in other countries also encounter ads every four or five songs when listening to music. Additionally, they can only skip six songs in the span of an hour and Spotify employs shuffle play that disables users to select what they want to listen to and if one wants to listen to a particular track, they can add it to the queue and hope it comes on.
Fortunately, Spotify has not implemented track skip limit or Shuffle Play in India, which means users here can skip and play the songs, all they want. However, upgrading to a premium Spotify account means there won’t be any annoying ads between songs. Additionally, there are some perks only a premium user gets to enjoy like the ability to download and listen to music offline and bumping up the audio playback quality to 320kbps. These features will help users to save up on data since the internet connectivity in India is still patchy in many areas.
So, does it make sense to upgrade to Spotify premium? Well, it depends. If you are someone who can’t bear ad interruptions while listening to music, or want to save data by downloading songs when streaming offline, then it makes complete sense to go for the Premium subscription. Additionally, keep in mind that Spotify is well known for using algorithms to curate playlists for users based on their mood. This is the key highlight of Spotify and we ourselves are impressed by how quickly the app learns from a user’s listening habits and plays favourable tracks accordingly.
Spotify is offering a 30-day free Premium tier trial so that one can try it before shelling out Rs 119 per month for the service. Interestingly, the app’s premium service can also be availed for one day or a week, along with the regular one month, six months and one-year prepaid plans. For students, Spotify premium is available with a great discount as it starts at Rs 59 per month, just Rs 1 shy of what Apple Music offers for students.
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Spotify, the popular music-streaming service is now available in India. The Android version of the app is listed on the Google Play Store in India and also supports upgrade to the premium account. The iOS version of the Spotify app can also be downloaded from the India App Store, however, the app does not appear to support an upgrade to the Premium account.
Spotify users can listen to music for free, though the free version of the app is not ad-free. Spotify also has a premium version, which starts with a 30-day free trial and comes with monthly price of Rs 119 per month. However, Spotify is also offering different price packs and payments options for its Premium version. Here’s a look at all the India prices of Spotify Premium.
Spotify Premium in India: Monthly Rs 119 per month, payment via credit card
The basic plan starts at Rs 119 per month. Users can subscriber to this by paying via debit or credit card. The first 30 days of this plan are free. For those who do not cancel their subscription before the trial ends, which would a month from the date, they will automatically be charged the subscription fee every month until they decide to cancel. The monthly subscription requires that you make a payment via credit card.
Read more: Spotify India launch: Subscription starts Rs 119 per month, but you can listen for free too
Spotify Premium in India: Top-up options at Rs 13 per day to Rs 1189 per year
Spotify is also showing some top-up options with payments options starting at Rs 13 per day to Rs 1189 for the entire year. Plans included at Rs 13 per day, Rs 39 for seven days, Rs 129 for one month, Rs 389 for three months, and Rs 719 for six months. The most expensive top-up plan is Rs 1,189 for one year, which is the Spotify Premium Yearly.
Spotify will cost Rs 119 per month for Premium service.Spotify Premium Vs Free India Vpn
The advantage with these options is that you can choose Paytm or Bhim UPI as an option for payments, along with credit card. The Rs 13 per day or the Rs 39 for seven days plan only shows Paytm or UPI as the available options.
Spotify Premium Prepaid
Spotify prices in India also include top-up plans. The payment options are Paytm, UPI BHIM as well.Spotify Premium for Students: Up to 50 per cent
Spotify is also offering its Premium service for students with up to 50 per cent discount. Users will need to confirm if they are enrolled at an accredited college or university. Spotify says it is relying on SheerID to verify Student status.
Spotify Premium Pricing
If this service is unable to verify the user, then they will not be eligible for the Student discount. Users can check if their school is listed or get them added to the list as well.
Spotify Premium Vs Free India Cricket
The discount will last 12 months at a time, with the option to renew a maximum of three times as long as the user is eligible. The manual submission for verification is limited to US students.
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Spotify Premium Free India
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