Spotify attracts huge interest

UK visits to Spotify, a new digital music-streaming service, have increased by 250 per cent since the service went public last month.

Founded by two Swedes in 2006 and based in London, Spotify offers free access to a huge library of music.

It was originally run on an invite-only basis, but it dropped this wall in February and has since experienced huge growth in the UK as well as around Europe.

According to the Financial Times about 250,000 people have downloaded Spotify's software in the UK; its total worldwide user numbers passed the million mark this month according to Spotify.

Hitwise, the web analytics firm said that searches for 'spotify' are also on the rise, increasing four-fold since it went public.

As well as a free ad-supported service, Spotify offers a 'premium' service for £9.99 a month, which comes without an ad interruptions.

Spotify has not revealed how many users are paying for the service, but Mark Mulligan, an analyst with Forrester, said that it's likely that "98.5 per cent plus of those 800,000 are free".

But as Mulligan points out this is still a hugely impressive base; "250,000 is more than four times higher than premium subscribers Napster has managed to accumulate in the UK after years of trying," Mulligan said.