Limited time, I don't understand

[Kanda]

Hi, I am not new to Spotify but I stopped using it when they started to play too many ads between songs. A friend told me it got better and that I should use it again, I've always liked this program so here I am. But I didn't know there was a daily limit of music I could listen to... back when I started using this, there were no limits 😕

Anyways my Spotify says something about 10 hour limit. The thing is, I listen to some music in the morning, then I go to class and, at night, when I come back, it says I've consumed my 10 hours limit. But I barely listened to an hour of music... I don't understand how that 10 hours limit works. My friend also has a free account and he's all like "I listen to it all day and it never tells me anything about a limit" so I don't understand. I think, if it's 10 hours per day, do this hours get consumed even when you're not playing music? 😕 I've also read something about 2'5 hours per day limit, and 10 monthly. Could someone explain how this works? xD

Also, yesterday something weird happened. I was listening to music, then my laptop restarted itself and when I got to open Spotify again, it said I had consumed my 10 hours and won't let me play anything. 2 minutes before I was listening to music without the red bar or anything saying that my time was almost over. Ughh.

Ok that was it. Sorry about my horrible english. I hope someone can help me, thank you.

[Peter__]

Hey! Welcome to the community 🙂

Spotify free accounts which have been registered for 6 months or more are subject to extra restrictions:
- Maximum streaming time of 10 hours per month (allocated as a maximum of 2.5 hours per week so you never need to wait more than 7 days to listen to music again!).
- In the UK and France, a maximum track play count of 5 plays.

You can read more about free account restrictions in your country here.

If your friend is not getting these restrictions, it will be because their account has not been registered for more than 6 months. Free restrictions can be removed at any time if you purchase an unlimited or premium subscription. 

Peter

[mkhcb]

So what prevents users from making another account to avoid this 10 hour limit?

[Peter__]

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@mkhcb wrote:

So what prevents users from making another account to avoid this 10 hour limit?

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To be honest nothing, I can't even see a clause in the EULA that would prevent it (although I don't have a legal brain!)

It is a bit of a pain to have to remake your playlists and things though. 

Peter

[kenkas]

I live in Denmark and got Danish advertisements, and one of them is about piracy (don't download music from the internet) and, translated to English they say: it's free and easy to listen to music on spotify, so why need pirated music.

problems with that sentence:

1. "free": you force people to buy a subscription by blocking them from listening to their music.

2. "easy": when you don't have more time  you have to wait for the next week before listening to more.

3. "so why need pirated music": you have to use pirated music  if you don't have more time.

So they're actually breaking the law with at least 2/3 of those

[Peter__]

@kenkas - Spotify free is "free" in the sense you don't have to pay for it at all, the time restrictions themselves do not force you to pay for the service therefore it is free. In that context to me "easy" refers to how easy it is to use the Spotify system to play your music. I don't think it is meant to be misleading (or breaks any advertising laws I can think of - but then again I'm not a legal expert!).