Leaving Spotify Was Surprisingly Easy
I quit Spotify after being a super user for ten years. It wasn't as hard as my mind anticipated it to be.
A few days before the clock struck midnight for 2025, I made a list of goals I hope to accomplish this new year. I immediately typed out “Leave Spotify” in my notes app, a task that’s been intimidating me for far too long. I joined Spotify in 2015 and was a super user from the jump. As a huge music enthusiast and music industry professional, I’d average hundreds of hours a month on the app, using it as a discovery tool and archival catalog of everything I’ve ever enjoyed listening to. Curating playlists for my friends and the special moments in my life is a creative outlet I’ve reveled in since middle school, carefully crafting mixed CDs for friends with their unique tastes in mind. When Spotify started gaining skyrocketing popularity in 2013, I looked at the platform with beating hearts in my eyes, categorizing my premium subscription as an “essential” monthly purchase when budgeting - taking space next to groceries, rent, and electricity.
As time went on, the allure of Spotify started dissipating. Spotify claims over 30% of the global music streaming marketplace, claiming the title as the most-used music streaming platform. So why isn’t Spotify giving the billions of dollars it’s making in annual revenue from OUR subscription payments to creators? Why is it taking that money and donating it to a political "leader" who couldn’t give less of a shit about the creators and listeners keeping the platform running?
I could go on and on and on, however, the reason I’m writing this piece isn’t to go on a rant about how horrible Spotify is. It’s to share that switching to an alternative is not as hard as your brain is anticipating it to be. I put off quitting Spotify and finding a new streaming service for FOREVER. I was overwhelmed by the idea of having to manually transfer my 200+ playlists over, worried about having to learn a new service, and just all around afraid of making the change (because day-to-day life is already way too hard and overwhelming as it is - why make things harder on myself?). One day I woke up and realized that my comfort and convenience isn’t worth handing over monthly payments to a service that is more concerned about A.I. “innovation” and appeasing shareholders than paying their creators a livable wage.
I recently posted about my decision to leave Spotify for TIDAL on an Instagram story. That post ended up being my most viewed and liked story EVER. I received an abundance of positive messages and stories about other’s experiences with leaving (and being happy they did). I also received several DMs from folks interested in making the switch, but inquiring about the process before they officially bit the bullet. That’s what the rest of this article is - a place for the answers to those questions to live! I hope sharing my experience and what I’ve discovered so far through the switch is the energizing boost you need to make a change as well.
Prefacing and Disclaimers
Before I get into this, I want to first preface that there isn’t really an “ethical” way to stream music. The best way to support music creators is by purchasing their merchandise, buying their music on Bandcamp or their website, purchasing physical albums (vinyl, CDs, tapes), or getting a concert ticket. Try to do this when your wallet allows! Buying physical media is true ownership anyway.
I would also like to state that this article is not sponsored by TIDAL or any other streaming platform. I am speaking from my own experience and what I’ve discovered during my transfer process. I implore you to do your own research and decide what best fits your needs (and the interests of the music creators you love).
Why did you choose TIDAL to switch to?
A huge part of my hesitancy with switching streaming services was largely due to the lack of other viable, ethical options. The “big three” are Spotify, Apple Music, and Amazon Music, all of which have their own ethical red flags.
Again, there is no ethical consumption under capitalism, but there are better options. I chose TIDAL because they pay artists higher than most other steaming platforms. The average payout per stream on TIDAL is $0.0125 - $0.014. To put that into perspective, that’s about 4x what Spotify pays artists. TIDAL pays around $12.84 per 1,000 streams. Spotify pays between $3-$5 per 1,000 streams, on average.
The user interface is clean, the generated playlists aren’t a curation of songs I already listen to all the time, and the music discoverability tools make me excited rather than frustrated to explore and dive into new music again.
Which method did you use to transfer your playlists?
There is a built-in integration within TIDAL called ‘TuneMyMusic’ that does all of the transferring for you. The first 500 tracks are free to transfer. If you have more than this (like I did), you can pay ~$5 for their monthly subscription to transfer unlimited tracks, then transfer your entire catalog and cancel your subscription after. The entire process took about 5 minutes. I also like that I got to choose which playlists I wanted to transfer over - it forced me to “spring clean” and leave behind my half-finished playlists so I could start fresh. TuneMyMusic also transfers music to other platforms outside of TIDAL!
Did you find everything you were listening to previously on Spotify? I’d like to switch but I’m scared to lose 90% of my playlist.
When I transferred my playlists over to TIDAL from Spotify, there were a few songs on my playlists that didn’t end up transferring over, but not enough to really make a difference or cause me to panic. If there is a song that I’m itching to listen to that isn’t on TIDAL, I’ll likely just pull up YouTube or purchase the track. For the most part though, a majority if not almost all of the songs I enjoy are available.
Are there any other streaming platforms you recommend outside of TIDAL?
In my research for a new streaming platform, I was recommended services like Deezer, SoundCloud, Bandcamp, and NTS radio. If you’d like to shop before you switch, consider checking some of these services out!