Spotify is officially expanding its offering beyond audio with the music video introduction. The streamer is launching a beta program that offers premium subscribers access to music videos on mobile, desktop and TV for a select number of tracks from artists including Ed Sheeran and Ice Spice.
In an email seen by TechCrunchSten Garmark, Spotify's vice president and global head of consumer experience, said: “We are starting with a limited subset of the full catalog, which includes thousands of music videos. Within this subset, we are looking to prioritize a wide range of genres and artists in our launch markets. YouTube (of course) and Apple Music already offer music videos, so this new feature helps Spotify compete with some of its biggest competitors.
To watch a music video, Spotify users listening to a song can click “switch to video” directly on the playback screen. The music video will always start the song from the beginning, but users can tap to return to the audio at any time. Even if the music video plays, Spotify will still queue the next song as audio only.
Currently, the beta option is only available in 11 countries, chosen based on “a number of criteria including market size and the availability of local content support,” Garmark said. While the United States didn't make the cut, the countries included represent a fairly global audience: Brazil, Colombia, Germany, Indonesia, Italy, Kenya, Netherlands, Poland, Philippines, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. Users in these nations must also have a premium account to watch music videos.
Rumors that Spotify might add music videos began last July following a series of layoffs (and more have come since then). This announcement is the first time that Spotify has announced the existence of music videos on its platform. However, a Reddit user posted three months ago that they had the “switch to video” option on a single song: My wayby Limp Bizkit.
