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Competitor Apple Music paid an average of one cent per stream in 2021, according to the Wall Street Journal. Singer and producer T-Pain shared a chart on Twitter in December that showed artists need 315 streams on Spotify to make $1, though it’s not clear what the source of this information is. That means it would take roughly 250 streams for an artist to earn $1. That’s how much money Spotify paid artists (through their rights holders) per stream in 2021, according to Insider. As of 2021, Spotify said it had paid $30 billion in royalties to the music industry, and the $7 billion paid out last year was more than double the amount paid out in 2017.
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