Spotify Claims Record Earnings in 2023 for Indie Artists, Songwriters and Non-English-Language Songs

variety.com:

Jem Aswad Executive Editor, Music Spotify has provided further details on the record $9 billion it paid out to the music industry in 2023, which was first announced in January.

For context, the company stated that the “amount has nearly tripled over the past six years, and represents a big part of the $48 billion-plus Spotify has paid since its founding.” Last March, the company said it pays out nearly 70% of every dollar it generates from music back to the industry, generating its music revenue from two sources: subscription fees from its Premium platform paying subscribers, and fees from advertisings on music on its Free tier.

Those rights holders include record labels, publishers, independent distributors, performance rights organizations and collecting societies.

It is important to note that all such payments go to rights holders first — which is usually a record label0 — which take their fee or percentage and then pay the artists or songwriters their share.