Spotify expands its offer with French audiobooks 🎧

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Since October 15, 2024, Spotify, the music streaming giant, is expanding its offering. Subscribers in France, Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands can now access a vast library of audiobooks in French and Dutch.

A library of 15,000 french audiobooks 📚

After testing and launching audiobooks in the United States and other English-speaking countries, Spotify is taking a new step in Europe. With 15,000 titles available in French, this new offering meets a growing demand for diverse audio content, thus strengthening the platform’s appeal. Users can now expect:

• 15,000 French audiobooks available immediately
• Access for users in France, Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands
• Integration of Dutch books, with a total of over 200,000 audio works in different languages

Source : Spotify

Source : Spotify

12 Free Hours and Additional Purchases Available for Premium Subscribers⏳

For its Premium subscribers, Spotify offers free audiobook listening for up to 12 hours per month. Once this limit is reached, users can purchase additional listening hours at a competitive price:

• 12 monthly listening hours included in Premium subscription
• Option to purchase additional 10-hour « blocks » for €9.99
• Free users don’t have access to free hours but can directly purchase audiobooks through the app

Expected Success Following Successful Canadian Experience 🌍

The success in Canada, the first bilingual market where Spotify tested its French audiobook offering, encouraged expansion into Europe. Since its launch last April, the platform has observed an impressive 2,461% growth in French listening in Canada.

This figure shows the potential of this new feature, especially since Spotify revealed that over 100 million users listened to French content between August 2023 and July 2024. Spotify hopes this trend will continue in France, where interest in audio content keeps growing.

Source : Spotify

Source : Spotify

Premium Offering Enhancement 💡

With this offering, Spotify isn’t just improving its service but doing so without immediately increasing the Premium subscription price. Members benefit from this new audiobook access at the same price, even though the platform might eventually review its prices upward:

• Rich offering at the same price: no immediate increase in Premium rates despite adding audiobooks
• Facing competition, Spotify distinguishes itself with varied content across podcasts, music, and now audiobooks

Although some users regret the absence of advanced technical features like spatial audio or lossless sound, Spotify is betting on content diversity to attract subscribers. Between podcasts and audiobooks, the platform has everything to capture a wider audience and enrich its users’ experience.

We’d love to hear your thoughts!!!
Will the addition of audiobooks transform listening habits of Spotify subscribers in France? Would you like this new feature to arrive in your country? Let us know in the comments.