Spotify’s hidden Fundamental tier can prevent money, if you could find it

Irritated by Spotify’s newest worth hike? You’ll be able to all the time dodge the rise by switching to a competing streamer, but when you’d fairly stick with Spotify, there’s one other possibility: a cheaper however well-hidden music-only tier. 

Spotify’s Fundamental plans aren’t new—they had been first introduced in mid 2024—however they’re simple to neglect and even more durable to identify, on condition that they’re buried on the backside of Spotify’s Premium plan listings. And you may’t join this service tier as a brand new person.

For a small month-to-month financial savings versus Spotify’s Premium plans, the Fundamental tier provides you nearly all of the identical options, together with ad-free entry to Spotify’s huge catalog of tunes, offline listening, and the power to play tracks in any order you would like. 

The most important distinction between Spotify’s Premium and Fundamental plans comes right down to audiobooks. Whereas Spotify Premium tiers embrace 15 hours of audiobook listening (both for particular person subscribers or for the “supervisor” of a Household or Duo plan), the Fundamental plan is only for music.  

One other distinction between the Fundamental and Premium plans is that solely the latter affords lossless music streaming, whereas Fundamental members should make do with lossy “high-quality” streaming. 

We’ve established that Spotify Fundamental is cheaper than Spotify Premium, however how a lot cheaper?

At its launch in June 2024, a person Fundamental plan price $10.99 a month, which was a buck cheaper than the $11.99 month-to-month cost for Premium Particular person on the time. (Earlier this week, Spotify introduced across-the-board worth hikes for its Premium plans, with the person tier going as much as $12.99 a month.) 

OK, so is the Fundamental Particular person plan nonetheless $10.99 a month? We’re checking on that (Spotify doesn’t reveal Fundamental tier pricing on its web site), and we’ll replace this story as soon as we get the official particulars.

Spotify additionally lists Fundamental Duo and Fundamental Household plans on its assist web site, however once more, no costs are listed. We’ve reached out for these particulars as nicely. 

Then there’s the method of signing up for a Fundamental plan. You’ll be able to’t simply go to Spotify.com and join Fundamental as a brand new person; as a substitute, you have to be a Spotify Premium subscriber first, and then you’ll solely discover the Fundamental possibility by downgrading your present plan—perhaps. 

In response to Spotify’s assist web page, solely “eligible” Spotify subscribers will see the Fundamental tier as an possibility when making an attempt to modify plans, that means some Premium members could not see the Fundamental plan in any respect. What makes you eligible for Fundamental? We’re checking that.

Lastly, Spotify notes that for those who do handle to enroll in a Fundamental plan however subsequently cancel, you possibly can by no means return. 

That’s the kind of situation sometimes connected to a grandfathered plan that’s being phased out, though a peek at the Wayback Machine reveals the proviso has been there since no less than early 2025. (Once more, we’ve requested Spotify about it.)