Apple Music still has a long ways to go if it ever wants to catch up to Spotify, but Apple’s streaming music service is still chugging along and picking up new subscribers, albeit slowly but surely. During a recent interview with Billboard, Apple executive Eddy Cue revealed that Apple Music just recently passed the 20 million subscriber threshold.
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Last we heard, Tim Cook said that Apple Music had 17 million subscribers as of this September, meaning that Apple Music enjoyed a 17% increase in subscribers in just about three months. While that’s nothing to be ashamed of, it’s still a far cry from Spotify’s cumulative total of 40 million paying subscribers.
Other points of interest include the fact that more than 50% of Apple Music subscribers reside overseas. What’s more, a majority of Apple Music subscribers haven’t purchased any songs off of the iTunes Music Store over the last 12 months, underscoring the fact that most consumers today aren’t concerned in the slightest about actually owning the music they listen to.
As for what the future of Apple Music holds, Cue told Billboard that we can expect more of the same, which is to say that Apple will remain obsessed with securing exclusive releases from big name artists such as Drake, Beyoncé and Chance the Rapper.
“We were thrilled to see that we could take [artists’] passions and drive them all the way to No. 1,” Cue said. “Chance the Rapper, who we put on Apple Music exclusively, hit the top 10 on the Billboard charts [based on streams alone], and I can’t recall that being done before.”
All told, Apple Music hasn’t been without its share of usability problems, but the service has undoubtedly come a long ways since its less than illustrious release 18 months ago.
