Spotify Has Partnered With One of Amazon’s Main Competitors in the Bookstore Market.
What do you mostly use Spotify for? Listening to music? Listening to your favorite podcasts? Listening to audiobooks? Well, the next time you open it (at least on Android), you might use it to buy a book—not just an e-book, mind you, but a physical one.
Spotify has officially become a bookstore.
As TechCrunch reports , Spotify is now selling physical books through its Android app to users in the US and UK, and plans to roll out the feature to iPhone next week. The company first announced this initiative back in February , announcing a partnership with Bookshop.org to streamline transactions. This isn’t your typical corporate arrangement: Bookshop.org aims to connect buyers with local, independent bookstores, not with any huge conglomerate or distributor. Bookshop claims that 50% of a book’s sale price goes directly to the publisher (who then pays the author), and 30% goes to the bookstore you choose at purchase. Another 10% goes into a profit-sharing fund, which is distributed among all the bookstores the site partners with.
It might seem a bit odd to buy books through Spotify, an app originally designed solely for music. But like many platforms, Spotify has adapted and expanded its offerings over the years. It already sold audiobooks, so why not print and ebooks? Essentially, Spotify now directly competes with Amazon as the go-to place for all your literary needs, whether you prefer reading or listening. Perhaps the next step will be the release of a Spotify-branded e-reader—though Spotify’s last attempt to sell its own device was unsuccessful .
Please note that Spotify doesn’t have a dedicated store for purchasing books. Instead, a “Get a copy for your bookshelf” button will appear under each audiobook. Selecting it will take you to that book’s page on Bookshop.org.
Spotify’s Page Match and Audiobook Recaps services will also receive updates.
In addition to this news, Spotify also announced an update to its Page Match feature, which allows you to sync your reading progress using your phone’s camera. This feature now supports over 30 languages, including French, German, and Swedish. Spotify’s audiobook summary feature, “Audiobook Recaps,” is now also available on Android. Previously exclusive to iOS, this feature allowed users to listen to a summary of an audiobook they’d already played.
The app’s audiobook charts have also been updated, showing users which books are currently best-selling. Audiobook charts were recently launched in Germany, and users in the US and UK now have a separate chart for the most popular children’s and family audiobooks.