How to Reach 250k Active Users with Development Plan Limited to 25 Test Users

[ChuckNuris]

Hi Spotify Team,

My team and I are working on a new app idea that integrates with Spotify in a creative and engaging way. Our concept involves allowing users to connect their Spotify accounts to our application so we can use the API to add tracks to their queue. Everything would happen through our app via Spotify’s API.

We’re currently exploring the available options for API access, and we’ve seen that the Development Plan allows us to test with up to 25 users. This is completely fine for initial testing. However, we also saw that in order to apply for the Production Plan, one of the listed requirements is to have at least 250,000 monthly active users.

This led to a major confusion:
• How are developers expected to reach or demonstrate 250,000 active users if the Development plan only supports testing with up to 25 users?
• Is there a sandbox or special evaluation path where Spotify can review the app concept before this threshold is met?
• What is the intended route for small developer teams like ours who are building serious but early-stage apps?

We really believe in our idea and would love to bring it to life using Spotify’s ecosystem, but the current structure seems to create a catch-22 for early growth.

Any clarification or guidance on this process would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you for your time.

[kingykongie]

They killed indie development.