Headwater

Spotify

2030 targets, May 2026 to 2030

Spotify is in the business of delivering creativity and culture to the world, helping artists, creators, and authors connect with audiences and grow their careers
How Spotify describes its business

Four ideas behind the targets

At its Investor Day on 21 May 2026, Spotify set targets for 2030: revenue growth in the mid-teens each year, a gross margin of 35% to 40%, and an operating margin above 20%. Its co-CEOs, Alex Norström and Gustav Söderström, set out four ideas for how Spotify will get there.

Build higher-priced plans and add-ons for Spotify’s most engaged listeners.

  • Audiobooks+ was on track to reach $100 million in annualised recurring revenue in July 2026.
  • The lifetime value of a US customer has risen by more than 70% since 2022.

Move from listening alone and passively to listening together and taking part.

  • Almost 50 million people have used Jam, which lets friends listen together.
  • Wrapped 2025 was shared 620 million times.

Move on from recommending what already exists to generating audio for each listener, with the listener in control.

  • Interaction with the DJ’s messages rose by nearly 20%.
  • Studio by Spotify Labs, a desktop app that makes personal audio briefings, is coming to Premium users in more than 20 markets as a research preview.

Put what listeners get out of their time first, ahead of how much of it Spotify takes.

  • Podcast discovery from the Home screen improved by 9%.

One day, a billion subscribers

At the Investor Day, Gustav Gyllenhammar, who runs Spotify’s markets and subscriptions, set out Spotify’s “conviction for one day reaching one billion subscribers”.

Use Spotify each month
0m
Pay for Premium
0m
The rest of a billion
Each dot is a million people.

Targets for 2030

Revenue growth

Mid-teens a year

15% at constant currency in the second quarter of 2026.

Gross margin

35% to 40%

33.4% in the second quarter of 2026. It was 32.2% in the last quarter of 2024 and 33.1% in the last quarter of 2025.

Operating margin

Above 20%

Operating income of €655m on revenue of €4,777m in the second quarter of 2026.

Free cash flow

Strong growth

€797m

In the second quarter of 2026, up 14%. Nearly €3 billion in 2025.

  1. The dated targets are rates and ranges.

    Mid-teens growth, a gross margin of 35% to 40%, and an operating margin above 20% can each be checked every quarter, long before 2030. We recommend this form for any target more than a year away: the company can tell each quarter whether it is on course.

  2. The billion is an ambition, with no date.

    Spotify speaks of one day reaching a billion subscribers, but it sets no year for it. The dated targets are the financial ones. We recommend keeping the two apart, so a long-term ambition does not turn into a deadline that nobody believes.

  3. Every quarter reports the same measures, and guides the next.

    Each set of results gives monthly users, Premium subscribers, gross margin, and operating income, then says what Spotify expects for each next quarter. We recommend the same habit for a company’s own plan: the same few numbers every time, with a forecast to check next time.

Sources

  1. 1. Spotify (2026). Spotify’s 2026 Investor Day recap: raising ambition for the next era of media. Spotify newsroom, 21 May 2026. newsroom.spotify.com
  2. 2. Spotify Technology S.A. (2026). Second quarter 2026 results. Form 6-K, 4 August 2026. sec.gov
  3. 3. Spotify (2026). Spotify reports fourth quarter 2025 earnings. Spotify newsroom, 10 February 2026. newsroom.spotify.com
  4. 4. Spotify (2025). Spotify reports fourth quarter 2024 earnings. Spotify newsroom, 4 February 2025. newsroom.spotify.com
  5. 5. Spotify (2024). Spotify reports fourth quarter 2023 earnings. Spotify newsroom, 6 February 2024. newsroom.spotify.com
  6. 6. Spotify Technology S.A. (2023). Q4 2022 update. Shareholder deck, 31 January 2023. s29.q4cdn.com

Headwater is not connected with Spotify Technology S.A. Spotify, Premium, Jam, Wrapped, and Audiobooks+ are trade marks of their owners. Updated 27 September 2026.

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