Spotify started monitoring family subscriptions. Those who fail the check will lose Premium

Spotify has started to more strictly monitor Premium Family subscriptions. Some plan members are being asked to prove that they live in the same household as the plan administrator. This time, filling in an address is not enough – both phones must be in the same place and scan a QR code.

Both phones must be together

The procedure is described directly on the Spotify support page. The plan administrator opens the QR code in the app by tapping their profile picture, in the section for managing their Premium. The member then scans it with their phone’s camera, with both devices needing to be physically together. Verification can only be done in the mobile app, and in its latest version.

Furthermore, the code changes every few seconds, so sending a screenshot to the administrator won’t help. Spotify itself states this in the troubleshooting section. According to Reddit users, the check primarily appears for members who do not live with the plan administrator.

Those who fail to verify will be banned for a year

The member has seven days from the moment they receive the notification to scan the code. If they miss the deadline or verification fails, they will automatically lose Premium and drop to the free version with ads. In addition, there’s an even more significant penalty: for another 12 months, they cannot join any other Family or Duo plan. However, they can purchase their own individual subscription.

Premium Family terms require all members to live at the same address, and Spotify has so far primarily checked this by requiring address entry, with a similar annual ban. The company tried GPS verification in 2018 but backed down after privacy criticism. On its support page today, it explicitly states that it does not track location.

Family plan costs fifty crowns per person

Spotify has a purely economic reason for tightening its rules. In the Czech Republic, Premium Family costs 299 CZK per month for up to six accounts, which is roughly 50 CZK per person. An individual Premium subscription costs 185 CZK per month, so six separate subscriptions would cost 1,110 CZK. Therefore, the family plan is often shared by friends or complete strangers.

It’s not convenient, but the check can be bypassed

However, even the QR code is not foolproof. Users on Reddit are already describing how to bypass the check via video call. One of them described how verification worked for his sister, who received the prompt a few days ago. The post author connected with her son via video call and shared his screen, pointing it at a tablet with a changing QR code. The sister then scanned the code with her phone directly from her son’s screen. According to the post, the whole process “only” required four devices.

The procedure is therefore more cumbersome than impossible. Even so, the QR code is significantly harder to bypass than simply entering an address. Real families could also suffer, for example, with students who live in dorms and cannot get home within a week.

Do you share a Spotify family subscription with someone who doesn’t live with you?

Sources: Spotify, Android Authority, 9to5Google, Reddit