How to increase your Spotify popularity score

With the Spotify Popularity score being a hidden metric on Spotify's end, only retrievable through their API or platforms like Musicstax Metrics, it's a good question to ask how to increase this metric.

It is thought that the Spotify popularity score powers a lot of the logic behind whether your song is recommended to others. Spotify actually uses this metric internally a lot by staff to easily be able to work out if songs should be featured or not, as they are able to get a good grasp on a songs performance across multiple metrics in a single metric.

A popularity score of 20%+ will typically get you onto Release Radar, and a popularity score of 30%+ will get you onto Discover Weekly. These two playlists are huge ways to get more exposure for your tracks and get you in front of new listeners.

When working out whether your track should be on these playlists, Spotify doesn't just count the stream amount. If you have a whole bunch of streams but the listener doesn't listen to the song for very long, isn’t saving it etc; Spotify deems that song as not very good - which is where the Spotify popularity index/score comes in - to aggregate a bunch of metrics into one metric. Things like this move your score up and down. Two songs released at the same time for example, can have the exact same number of streams, but wildly different popularity scores if one is being engaged with better than the other.

What not to do

Purchasing streams, followers or playlist placement

Playlist/stream purchasing is quite possibly one of the worst things you can do to both your Spotify artist account and a release. Why? While the initial stream hit might make you feel good seeing those numbers go up, those "bot" accounts aren't going to be coming back to your music and engaging with it regularly, which will damage your Spotify popularity score for your track and your artist profile popularity score. This means when Spotify looks at your song, it can see a whole bunch of people listening to it, but they don’t come back. To them, it must mean that it’s bad if people aren’t coming back. Spotify is also increasing its tracking of these fake streams, which could land your distributor with a fine, which could be passed onto you and see all of your music removed from Spotify.

Purchasing playlist placements could also land you on a non-legitimate playlist, which either is completely the wrong genre to your song (meaning people will skip over your track on the playlist/not engage very well with it, helping drive down your popularity score), or the playlist creator will end up stream-botting the playlist landing you with the same issues as above with non-legitimate streams with zero engagement after the initial stream.

Any service which promises to get you X amount of streams or followers will most likely use bots to do this, meaning you should steer clear of them. Remember: while the stream/follower counts might look good, the Spotify popularity score (which drives their algorithm) heavily focuses on how often people engage with your music during that stream, as well as after. One-off streams to a track by an account negatively impact that release. These bot accounts are also likely to be used against such a wide range of artists of different genres that Spotify will have difficulty working out who your listeners are to try to recommend your song to more. You might be able to tell that some artists are streambotting when you look at their “similar artists” on Musicstax or Spotify, because the algorithm is suggesting such random artists who aren’t even a similar genre as they have both been engaging in stream-botting by the same accounts.

How to increase your Spotify popularity score

Increasing your popularity score works much better when you do it legitimately and organically.

Before release

Pitch your song to Spotify.

Before releasing a song, you can give it a bit of a head start by pitching it to Spotify through Spotify for Artists. While this isn't a guaranteed way to get you any streams or editorial placement, based on our own statistics, at least 10% of the artists we track on Musicstax Metrics have been placed on a Spotify editorial playlist at some point. Pitching your song to Spotify is the primary way to do this.

You can do this on Spotify for Artists at least 7 days before the release date of your song. When you go to distribute your song, you want to make sure you have at least a bit of a buffer room from your submission to the release day to allow you to have the 7-day window. Submitting your song also gets it onto your followers' Release Radar, which is an added bonus.

When you submit your song pitch, you want to include as much information as possible, as your submission will be one of the thousands sent to the Spotify editors weekly. Make it stand out, and select the instruments and genre correctly to help it get onto the right Spotify editorial playlist.

Generate “hype” through social media

One of the biggest things going on in the music industry right now is using the likes of TikTok or Instagram Reels to test the waters with music, and generate hype. Posting engaging teasers of a song can help you see if a song will even go down well with your fans/people who come across your TikTok’s/Reels. If you do manage to hook a number of people onto the song, they’re likely to be heavily looking forward to a proper release of the song, which will help boost those initial numbers on release helping propel your popularity score. Be sure not to tease the song for too long, as you’re likely to get many people over waiting, and you could end up releasing to a bunch of fans who are over waiting. I’ve seen artists trying to generate hype by teasing songs daily for months on end, which just leads to people getting quite angry in the comments that it hasn’t been released.

After release: Push, push, push

The first initial weeks of your music release are quite important when it comes to Spotify’s algorithms. It is easier in the first few weeks to increase your popularity score as you’re not having to fight previous data (eg: trying to push a song which has been out for years which may have had bad data).

Paid advertising

If you have the budget, paid advertising on channels such as Meta (Instagram/Facebook) are one of the best ways to try and get exposure. There are many tutorials on how to do this online, and the cost per result/click can be as good as a few cents. Your aim is to get people listening to your song, who become fans and then through time you make your money back on their streams. If you’re not generating fans who come back to your music, or getting free streams from algorithmic streams - this method will cause you to lose money. It is however possible if you can get people to engage with your catalog to make your media spend back in a few months. Be sure when setting up the ads to target the right people/audience, otherwise you could end up actually affecting your popularity score if people go to listen to your song and skip straight away.

Collaborate with artists in your genre

Easier said than done, but collaborating with other artists a similar size to you can be beneficial for tapping into each others audience - especially if there already isn’t an overlap in audiences. This introduces your music to people who are already inclined to appreciate your style, significantly increasing your chances of sustained engagement from your collaborators listeners. Collaborative releases also tend to get higher initial engagement rates, as listeners of both artists often save, share, and repeatedly stream the track, which is exactly the kind of activity Spotify rewards with higher popularity scores.

User-generated content

Encouraging your listeners to create their own content featuring your music can significantly boost off platform engagement, which in turn can cause people to seek out your music on Spotify. Platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube Shorts thrive on user-generated content - with it being quite easy to add a song to your short videos. If listeners create and share engaging videos using your tracks, it drives organic discovery, more streams, and deeper listener engagement. Be sure to engage with fans who create content with your music to keep up the encouragement, and I have also seen some artists host challenges or contests to see who can get the most exposure/engagement with their short form videos which gives your fans a reason to post these in the first place. Having more people using your music in their reels, etc also means that the Instagram, TikTok or YouTube Short algorithm is more likely to suggest your song for others.

Keep releasing music consistently

Consistency is key when it comes to building a sustainable Spotify popularity score and also fan base. Regular releases keep listeners engaged and coming back to your catalogue. Frequent new releases also provide regular opportunities to pitch your songs for playlist inclusion, further increasing your exposure and potential audience engagement. Maintaining momentum helps avoid the "drop-off" in listeners that can negatively impact your popularity score over time. You’ll notice on yours or other artists metrics that there can be quite a decent drop off in monthly listeners for example if you haven’t released anything fresh for a while. Your listeners move on to other peoples newly released music - which in turn causes a drop off in your metrics.

Analyze and adjust using data

Utilize the insights provided by tools such as Musicstax Metrics and Spotify for Artists. Regularly reviewing this data helps identify what's working and what isn't. Pay attention to metrics such as listener retention, skips, saves, and shares. Adjust your promotional strategies based on these insights - whether tweaking advertising campaigns, selecting collaborators differently, or altering release strategies. Continuous analysis allows you to refine your approach and focusing on improving your Spotify popularity score can help your songs grow through the Spotify algorithm. If you can see a song is beginning to drop off in popularity scores and your algorithmic streams are beginning to drop, perhaps a Meta advertising campaign can help get your popularity score back up and get you back into the algorithm.