Spotify enthusiastically promoted
Ocean Eyes on its Today’s Top Hits playlist. She is now the youngest artist with a billion streams to her name, and Spotify’s most-streamed female artist for the past two years.
The new hit squad
Buda Mendes/Getty Images
Appearing on a prominent Spotify playlist is therefore a big deal.
Economists Luis Aguiar and Joel Waldfogel calculated (in 2018) that a song appearing on Today’s Top Hits was worth about 20 million extra streams and $159,905 (US$116,000) to $224,694 (US$163,000) in royalty payments.
That was when Today’s Top Hits had about 18.5 million subscribers. It now has more than 26 million.