Spotify Q4 ’25 Earnings Report Reveals Subs, Net Income Growth

Photo Credit: Alexander Shatov

Spotify has posted seemingly solid Q4 2025 results, including double-digit Premium growth, “the highest MAU net adds” of any quarter to date, and an operating income spike to boot.

The DSP shed light on that quarterly showing (plus its full-year results) just moments ago; right on cue, pre-market trades propelled Spotify stock (NYSE: SPOT) closer to $500 per share, for a 15% boost off the bat.

Regarding the numbers responsible for SPOT’s latest resurgence, the company pointed to an average of 751 million MAUs for Q4 2025, up 11% year over year (YoY). Within the total, Premium subscribers increased 10% YoY to 290 million, with the ad-supported user total rising 12% YoY to 476 million.

Both figures exceeded Spotify’s guidance, and by region, emerging markets continued to record particularly significant user growth.

All told, nearly 60% of Spotify MAUs resided in Latin America (21%) or nations outside North America, Latin America, and Europe (37%) during Q4, with North America (16%) and Europe (26%) rounding out the list.

Nevertheless, Spotify’s subscriber base remained heavily concentrated in North America (25%) and Europe (36%), against a combined 38% for Rest of World (15%) and Latin America (23%).

Per the business, subscriber growth “outperformance [was] led by Rest of World and North America” – an interesting fact in light of the differences between Spotify’s domestic pricing and competitors’ charges.

Of course, it’ll also be worth tracking the service’s subscribership results from here given last month’s U.S. price bumps.

Closer to the present, Spotify generated €4.53 billion (currently $5.39 billion) during 2025’s final quarter, reflecting a 7% YoY improvement.

As for the discrepancy between the user and revenue growth percentages, the company posted an 8% YoY Premium gain (to $4.78 billion/€4.01 billion) and another ad-supported slip (down 4% YoY to $617 million/€518 million).

Despite the DSP’s ongoing advert-monetization woes, the category did achieve a 16% revenue hike from 2025’s third quarter. As Spotify relaxed its free-tier restrictions in September – and, as mentioned, again raised prices last month – this trend might hold steady moving forward.

Finally, Spotify’s operating income, in skyrocketing 47% YoY, topped $833 million/€700 million on the quarter and exceeded the forecasted $738 million/€620 million. And gross margin finished at 33.1% as gross profit rose 10% YoY to nearly $1.8 billion/€1.5 billion, with net income jumping substantially YoY to $1.4 billion/€1.2 billion.

Looking ahead to the remainder of the current quarter, Spotify’s guidance probably won’t contribute to runaway investor expectations. Overall, execs are anticipating that Q1 will bring 759 million MAUs (for net growth of 8M), 293 million subs therein (up 3M), total revenue of $5.4 billion/€4.5 billion (essentially flat, that is), and operating income of $786 million/€660 million.

Evidently, the market isn’t bothered by this measured forecast or the advert-revenue slide; SPOT was still riding high in pre-open trading at the time of publishing.

During the corresponding conference call, ahead of a scheduled May 21st Investor Day, execs didn’t divulge any groundbreaking details.

But they did dub 2026 the “year of raising ambition,” take a video-podcasting victory lap (the platform hosts over 530,000 video shows, per co-CEO Alex Norström), and, when fielding questions, frame AI as a massive growth opportunity with plenty of room yet to evolve.

Regarding the latter, co-CEO Gustav Söderström painted Spotify as well-positioned to help artists monetize catalog releases with AI – and teased ongoing discussions. Additionally, he declined to specify the percentage of uploads pumped out by machines, instead reiterating a desire to see AI creation disclosures become the norm.