Does Spotify use up cellular data on Wi-fi?

[matthewso1]

Hi, 

I don't know much about electronics, except that I need to stay within my data plan budget.

I checked my cellular data usage and found that Spotify uses up a good chunk of my data (I'm still well within my budget), but I'd like to educated on this issue:

So, when I'm on WI-fi, how much, if any, cellular data does Spotify use?

If, I'm not on Wi-fi, how much, if any, cellular data does Spotify use?

Let's take for example a 1 hour time period on a free membership. How much data could one reasonably expect for this application to use?

Best.

[matthewso1]

Also, bare in mind, that I've used 44.5 MB of Spotify thus far, and I've probably used about 30 minutes of listening time.

But, I don't know how much of that time was spent on a secure Wi-Fi network versus a cellular data plan. 

I believe I deactivated the use of Spotify on my cellular data plan, but who knows if it actually listened to me...

[user-removed]

Just doing some brief maths for you, this is assuming you have 1GB of data purely for Spotify just to make the calculations easier and ignores data caching which might occur if you listen to tracks more than once:

At 96kbps you can stream ~ 24 hours of content.

At 160kbps you can stream ~ 14.5 hours of content. 

At 320kbps you can stream ~ 7.25 hours of content.

You do know that you can also download music over wifi before leaving home to save on data bandwidth? Streaming at 96 kbps will give you 3.3333 times as much music as 320kbps for the same data usage.

Also you can open up Spotify Settings on your phone, then open up Streaming Quality and make sure "Download Using Cellular" box is not enabled. Having the app online but listening to offline playlists will use a little bit of data, as it will report your track plays and scrobble tracks to Facebook and Last.FM still (unless you force offline mode from the settings menu).

Also check out this Idea below, give some Kudos and leave a comment.

https://community.spotify.com/t5/Live-Ideas/Smart-Offline-Mode-for-Mobile-Apps/idi-p/25675

[matthewso1]

I think that offline plays can only be accessed with premium account.

[user-removed · Accepted solution]