The streaming giant is positioning itself as a one-stop shop for music fans, from discovery to the venue door
Spotify has approached concert promoters about licensing live festival video and struck a multi-year deal with Live Nation to pre-save tickets for its most engaged Premium subscribers. The moves come as Spotify pushes deeper into video to offset a 5% ad revenue decline.
Spotify has approached concert promoters about licensing the rights to stream live video from music festivals, according to Bloomberg, as the Swedish streaming company pushes to become a broader hub for the live music economy. The company has already started adding footage from live events, including a Dua Lipa show in Mexico City.
The live video talks are running alongside a separate, more concrete initiative. Spotify struck a multi-year deal with Live Nation, the world’s largest concert promoter and ticket seller, to launch a feature called Reserved. Starting this summer with select US tours, Spotify will identify an artist’s most dedicated listeners and hold up to two tickets per fan ahead of general sale.
Eligibility is determined by streaming data, including listening frequency, how long someone has followed an artist, and whether the behaviour appears organic rather than bot-driven. Eligible users receive an email and an in-app notification with a roughly 24-hour purchase window. Bloomberg reported that Spotify is paying tens of millions of dollars for the ticketing rights, outflanking Apple and Amazon to secure the Live Nation exclusivity.
The play mirrors what American Express does with concert presales to retain cardholders, except Spotify’s leverage is streaming data rather than spending history. The company initially planned to bundle ticketing access into a more expensive “super premium” tier but abandoned that approach. Instead, it is rolling out perks designed to make the free-to-paid upgrade more compelling, or to justify the existing Premium price as competitors close in.
The 💜 of EU tech
The latest rumblings from the EU tech scene, a story from our wise ol' founder Boris, and some questionable AI art. It's free, every week, in your inbox. Sign up now!
Spotify’s interest in live video is driven by a broader push into video that has been underway for more than a year. The company has secured rights to show premium music videos, acquired video rights for podcasts, and signed a $100 million joint deal with Netflix for Jay Shetty’s On Purpose podcast, with the video version moving exclusively to both platforms. CEO Daniel Ek has framed 2026 as the year Spotify becomes a media platform rather than a music streamer.
The video strategy has a financial motive. Spotify’s ad-supported revenue fell 5% year on year to €385 million in the first quarter of 2026, its second consecutive quarterly decline. Video advertising commands higher rates than audio, and keeping users watching rather than just listening creates more ad inventory to sell.
YouTube has demonstrated the market for live concert streaming for over a decade, broadcasting Coachella to millions of viewers who cannot score tickets or make the trip to the California desert. Disney and Hulu have followed with festivals like Bonnaroo. Spotify entering the category would add a competitor with a distinct advantage: it already knows which artists each of its 761 million monthly active users listens to most.
That user base, 293 million of whom pay for Premium, is also what makes the ticketing angle potent. Live music is the largest revenue source for many artists, and Spotify is positioning itself as the conduit between musicians and the fans most likely to show up. The company already surfaces concert listings and podcast clips to keep users engaged across formats.
The expansion has not been without tension. Parts of the music industry see Spotify’s diversification into podcasts, audiobooks, and now video as an attempt to dilute artists’ share of the platform’s revenue pool. Spotify’s counter-argument is that it is building tools that help artists monetise their most engaged fans, not just stream counts. The verified artist badge it introduced earlier this year, which excludes AI-generated profiles, was part of the same trust-building effort.
How much live video Spotify ultimately secures remains unclear. Bloomberg’s report describes talks with promoters, not signed deals, and the company declined to comment on the ticketing financials. But the direction is unmistakable: Spotify wants to own the journey from song discovery to the venue door, and it is spending accordingly.
Get the most important tech news in your inbox each week.
