Edgar Cervantes / Android Authority
TL;DR
- Spotify's been having some trouble this year keeping ads away from Premium subscribers.
- While those incidents were not intentional, a persistent rumor claims that Spotify is bringing ads to Premium.
- The company is publicly denying that claim, insisting that “Premium music listening is and will remain ad-free.”
Life used to be so simple: We could enjoy content for free (like listening to music on the radio) and have to sit through some advertising, or we could choose to pay for our content (like buying an album) and get to enjoy it ad-free. That dichotomy didn't take long to start crumbling, though, and these days we tolerate ads in paid services ranging from cable TV to the cheapest Netflix plan. Lately, we've been paying a lot of attention to Spotify Premium, because this is one paid service that's resisted ad creep, rightfully earning its “premium” name.
At least, that's the way it's supposed to work, but on a couple separate instances over the past few months, Spotify Premium users were hearing ads that they weren't meant to. The company insisted this was all in error, and managed to restore ad-free playback, but apparently it hasn't been able to fully shake the specter of these incidents.
In a post on X this afternoon, Spotify attempts to address some persistent rumors about ads coming to Premium:
There is a rumor circulating that Spotify is putting ads into premium music listening. This rumor is false. Premium music listening is and will remain ad-free.
It's unclear if there have been any recent occurrences of that earlier ad bug that might be fueling such speculation, but we do see Spotify's account responding to messages from users asking about this rumor over the course of the past few days.
We've certainly seen other “premium” services drift into more ad content over the years (I'm looking at you, Prime Video), so it's not crazy to wonder why this fear might be so difficult for Spotify to dismiss once and for all, but its statements about remaining ad-free in the future sure feel about as reassuring as we could hope for.
