For the second time in four months, Spotify is hiking prices in South Africa – this time, though, there’s more value on offer, including lossless (non-compressed) music streaming for the first time.
New Premium plans – Lite, Standard and Platinum – are being introduced in five markets around the world: South Africa, India, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. A Duo plan, offering a discount for two subscribers, has been discontinued in South Africa.
The new plans are:
- Spotify Premium Lite, offering one account and audio quality up to 160kbit/s: R69.99/month
- Spotify Premium Standard, offering downloads and streaming quality of up to 320kbit/s: R94.99/month
- Spotify Premium Platinum, offering up to three user accounts (for people living under the same roof), lossless audio (24-bit at 44.1kHz), some audiobook integration, a personal AI deejay, AI playlist creation and the ability to connect third-party deejay software: R179.99/month
There’s also a Premium Student account at R47.99/month (up from R37.99/month previously), which offers the same benefits as the Standard plan.
The new plans effectively introduce price hikes across the board and follow price hikes in September, when the individual premium plan was hiked from R64.99 to R69.99/month — and now to R94.99/month.
Read: AI vs artists: who owns the future of music?
The price adjustments make Spotify significantly more expensive than Apple Music in South Africa. Apple offers an individual plan, which includes lossless streaming, for R69.99/month. Apple’s family plan – roughly equivalent to Spotify’s new Premium Platinum tier – costs R109.99/month, while a student plan is R34.99/month.
Like Apple Music, Tidal, which also offers lossless audio, costs R69.99/month for its premium Individual plan. – © 2025 NewsCentral Media
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