Spotify ditches the 5-play song limit in the UK

Spotify
Limits? What limits?

Starting today, Spotify has removed its restrictions on free UK users, allowing them to play individual tracks as many times as they like.

Spotify introduced its five-plays-per-song cap in April 2011 as a means to encourage users to pay up for the premium models, though the limit has been absent in the US and Australia.

But today all that has changed, and Brits can rejoice at being able to crank out those party playlists time and time again without having to turn to YouTube streams when faced with greyed-out tracks.

However, the ten-hour listening limit per month is still in place and you'll have to shell out £5 a month to get proper unlimited listening.

No more greys

Spotify told us: "The 10-hours a month limit after 6 months still applies, and the free service remains ad-supported as always."

The music subscription service, which now has more than 6 million paying customers around the world, made the announcement on its blog this morning.

This now puts UK in line with most of the world (sorry France, your limit is still in place).

Hugh Langley

Hugh Langley is the ex-News Editor of TechRadar. He had written for many magazines and websites including Business Insider, The Telegraph, IGN, Gizmodo, Entrepreneur Magazine, WIRED (UK), TrustedReviews, Business Insider Australia, Business Insider India, Business Insider Singapore, Wareable, The Ambient and more.


Hugh is now a correspondent at Business Insider covering Google and Alphabet, and has the unfortunate distinction of accidentally linking the TechRadar homepage to a rival publication.