Spotify has rolled out a major update to its free streaming service, now allowing users without a subscription to select and play specific songs on demand. This move follows closely after the platform’s recent introduction of lossless music streaming, a feature reserved for paying subscribers.
Free users can now enjoy three new capabilities dubbed “Pick & Play,” “Search & Play,” and “Share & Play.” These allow them to pick any track directly within the app, search for the exact song they want, and play it immediately.
Additionally, the “Share & Play” feature encourages people to launch Spotify when they come across a track shared on social media networks such as Instagram, which supports sharing Spotify songs with full audio in Stories and Notes.
Previously, free listeners were restricted to shuffled playback and limited skips on mobile devices. Spotify has specified that while free mobile users will have a daily allowance of “on-demand time,” once they exceed this, their number of skips per hour will be curtailed. The precise limits have not been disclosed, but these constraints do not apply to Premium subscribers, who enjoy complete flexibility.
Recently, the company’s advertising revenue has shown signs of strain. CEO Daniel Ek admitted Spotify has been “moving too slowly” in expanding its ad business. Although the company aims for advertising to account for 20% of total revenue, it only made up 11% as of June 2025.
Spotify hopes to increase engagement and expose more free users to advertisements, helping to bolster this revenue stream by enriching the free experience with these new features.
Other premium-only features, including lossless audio quality, AI-generated playlists, and the Mix tool, remain exclusive to subscribers. Meanwhile, social features like Messages and personalised playlists such as Daylist are still accessible to both free and paid users.
Free tier subscribers form the majority of Spotify’s overall audience. In the most recent quarter, the platform reported 696 million monthly active users, with 433 million using the ad-supported free tier and 276 million holding Premium subscriptions.