SPOTIFY IS INCREASING the cost of its ad-free, premium services in more than 50 countries, including Ireland and the UK.

A total of 53 countries will be impacted by the changes, which Spotify said is required “so that we can keep innovating”.

“These updates will help us continue to deliver value to fans and artists on our platform,” said a statement on the platform’s newsroom.

Existing subscribers are due to receive an email explaining what these changes mean for their account.

In Ireland, the Individual premium plan now costs €10.99 a month, an increase of €1.

The Duo plan has also increased by €1 and now stands at €14.99 a month.

There are no changes to premium Student or Family prices, which are €5.99 and €17.99 a month respectively.

However, both these plans were subject to price increases in April 2021, when the Family plan jumped from €14.99 per month to the current €17.99.

The Student plan price increased in April 2021 by €1 to the current €5.99.

The Duo plan, now costing €14.99, was also subject to a price increase in 2021, jumping from €12.49 to €13.99 per month.

Only the Individual plan, now standing at €10.99, was spared a price increase in 2021.

Impacted subscribers will be given a one-month grace period before the new price becomes effective, unless they cancel before the grace period ends.

Those currently on a trial offer will have one month at the original price after the trial period ends.

After that, the new price for your plan will come into effect.

Spotify has more than 200 million global subscribers but has never posted a full-year net profit despite its success in the online music market.

It has expanded into new markets in recent years, including exclusive content such as podcasts.

In January of this year, Spotify announced job losses which impacted 6% of its workforce.

In a Spotify blogpost, CEO Daniel Elk said there was a need for “speed” and “efficiency” and that this resulted in a need to make a “difficult but necessary decision to reduce our number of employees”.

The Spotify CEO added: “Over the last few months we’ve made a considerable effort to rein-in costs, but it simply hasn’t been enough.”