Spotify said it has removed more than 50 million tracks that appear to be made by artificial intelligence from its curated music recommendations so far this year. The streaming company shared the figure in a statement on Tuesday.
The effort is aimed at keeping AI-generated music from crowding out human artists on the platform.
“AI-generated slop and spam don’t belong in your recommendations, and we’ve made changes to keep them out and protect the listening experience,” Spotify said.
Last year, the company removed 75 million tracks for what it called serious or repeated violations of its rules. Those rules ban copying an existing creator’s content or creating media artificially with technology.
How Spotify Found the AI Tracks
Spotify said it turned to its listeners for help. The company studied songs that users often skipped or ignored over the past six months.
Those tracks consistently overlapped with AI-generated audio, which is sometimes called “slop.”
Spotify combined this listener feedback with metadata and third-party AI-detection tools. It then updated its internal recommendation system to limit how often AI-generated content appears.
The company said AI-detection technology has limits. It added that spotting suspicious content could become harder as generative AI develops.
What It Means for Artists
AI-generated music can affect how much human artists are paid. Artists on Spotify earn money partly based on how often their music is played compared with the total number of streams on the platform.
“If the denominator has grown because of AI slop, the percentage that each legitimate rights holder or artist will receive is diminished,” said Morgan Hayduk, CEO of Beatdapp. His company sells AI and fraud-detection software to music labels and distributors.
To earn royalties on Spotify, an artist must reach at least 1,000 streams. This happens far less often for AI tracks than for music made by people.
Not every artist who uses AI publishes what Spotify may consider slop. Earlier this year, Spotify launched an AI credits feature that lets artists disclose which parts of a song involved AI.
Spotify also labels artist profiles it believes are AI-generated with an “AI Persona” badge. These profiles are left out of user recommendations by default.
Only listeners who choose to follow a specific AI artist will see that persona recommended to them.
More than 300,000 artists are now verified on Spotify. They represent more than 99% of what listeners search for on the platform.
Spotify said its efforts have led to a “marked decrease” in listener concerns about AI spam showing up in their recommendations.
“AI moves fast and bad actors adapt just as fast,” the company said. “But as AI makes music more abundant, we believe listeners will value human artistry even more.”
