Spotify has launched a new website where fans can purchase concert tickets for their favorite artists directly from the streaming platform. The launch of Spotify Tickets hasn’t been advertised in any way, as it is currently a test product only. The platform only sells tickets to a limited number of upcoming events by various artists.
Debutants include Limbeck, Annie DiRusso, Dirty Honey, Crows, TOKiMONSTA, Four Year Strong, and Osees. Musically says the tickets, which Spotify will begin selling today, will come from artists in pre-sales for upcoming concerts.
According to TechCrunch, Spotify Tickets events are not yet available in the Live Events Feed, though that may change in the future. The official Spotify Tickets support page states that the company sells tickets on behalf of event partners, such as concert venues, event organizers, fan clubs, and the artists themselves. So it’s the partners who set ticket prices, but Spotify charges a booking fee, which it promises to explain to customers before they make a ticket purchase.
If artists choose to sell tickets themselves, this service can be an important source of income for them. Spotify already has special sections on artists’ pages to notify them about various events and concerts. Now it will be possible to go straight from the page to buy tickets.
The service can also help make sure that tickets are bought by real fans and not resellers. The service’s support page says that buyers cannot “resell, assign or transfer” tickets, except in certain states.
To enter the event, buyers will need to show a government-issued ID. As such, if they decide to sell the ticket, they will have to transfer ownership. And that process is quite complicated and requires sellers to contact Spotify to change the name associated with the ticket.
There is no official launch date – or even assurances that it will come out of the testing phase – right now. “At Spotify, we routinely test new products and ideas to improve our user experience. Some of those end up paving the path for our broader user experience and others serve only as important learnings. Tickets.spotify.com is our latest test. We have no further news to share on future plans at this time,” a Spotify spokesperson reported.
