Spotify says it has taken more than 50 million “AI-generated slop and spam” tracks out of its recommendations so far this year.
The streaming platform disclosed the figure on Tuesday (October 20) in a one-year update on the AI protections it announced in September 2025.
The 50 million tracks are in addition to more than 75 million “spammy tracks” that Spotify says it has removed from its platform entirely for “serious or repeated violations” of its rules.
A Spotify spokesperson confirmed to MBW that the 75 million figure is the one the company gave in September 2025. The company said at the time that those tracks had been removed over the prior 12 months.
The spokesperson said Spotify has continued removing content that “seriously or repeatedly breaks our rules” since then, but is not sharing an updated figure.
“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 in a blog post.
“Earlier this year, we looked closely at the tracks listeners were skipping, ignoring, or telling us they didn’t want to hear,” said Spotify. “A clear pattern emerged: these tracks were consistently ones identified as slop or spam.”
Spotify said it has made “numerous updates” to its recommendation system over the past six months to remove slop and spam, and to surface more music made by “authentic, human artists.”
Spotify‘s editors apply the same standard and do not program content identified as slop or spam, the company said.
“Since we made these changes, we’ve seen a marked decrease in listener concerns about this content showing up in recommendations,” said Spotify.
“No single signal catches slop or spam on its own, so we combine many: listener engagement and feedback, upload patterns, metadata, and information from multiple third-party AI detection tools,” said Spotify. “AI detection technology in particular has limitations, and it will only get harder as generative AI evolves.”
Spotify added that it watches for new tactics, including mass uploads, duplicates, SEO manipulation, “spammy playlist networks,” and artificially short tracks.
Spotify also shared new data on its 1,000-stream royalty threshold.
Under the policy, which took effect in April 2024, a track must reach 1,000 streams, and a minimum number of unique listeners, within the previous 12 months to earn recording royalties.
“Our 1,000-stream royalty threshold, in place since 2024, has become a first line of defense for human artists against the wave of AI-generated content,” said Spotify. “Tracks with indicators showing a high probability of being AI-generated are 10 times more likely to fall below the threshold, making it harder for bad actors to attempt to syphon royalties away from real artists by generating music at scale.”
The update included new figures for the artist and listener tools Spotify has introduced over the past year.
“Thousands” of artist profiles now carry the company’s AI Persona badge, which flags artists whose identities Spotify believes are AI-generated.
The company announced the badge in August.
By default, AI Personas do not appear in Spotify‘s editorial or algorithmic recommendations unless, for example, a listener chooses to follow one.
“Spotify is currently the only major streaming service that labels when an artist’s identity is believed to be AI-generated,” the company claimed.
Artists are now submitting “tens of thousands” of AI Credits every day, according to Spotify.
The feature, which launched in April, lets artists disclose which roles and instruments on a song involved AI, and the information appears in Song Credits on mobile.
Spotify said it is working on more ways for listeners to see when an artist has disclosed AI use.
More than 300,000 artists are now verified under the Verified by Spotify program, which the company introduced in April.
Spotify said those artists represent more than 99% of what listeners search for on the platform, and that more than 70% of them are independent.
Spotify launched Artist Profile Protection in beta in March, allowing artists to review releases that list them as an artist before those releases reach their profile.
“Thousands” of artists have opted in to the beta, according to Spotify.
“For the first time on any streaming service, artists have a proactive layer of defense against the wrong content landing on their page, and we’re making the tool available to all artists by the end of the year,” said Spotify.
In September 2025, Spotify introduced a new impersonation policy, announced a music spam filter that it said would roll out that fall, and committed to supporting a new DDEX standard for AI disclosures in music credits.
Spotify‘s update comes as rival streaming services expand their own AI labeling.
YouTube Music began labeling songs made “primarily using generative AI” on October 14, using partner disclosures alongside its own detection tools.
Apple Music launched AI Transparency Tags in March, relying on labels and distributors to declare AI use. In August, it made the tags mandatory where AI was used to create “a material portion of the content,” and told industry partners they would be shown to listeners as “Made With AI” labels later this year.
Deezer, which uses its own technology to detect and tag AI-generated music, already keeps fully AI-generated tracks out of its algorithmic recommendations and editorial playlists. It said on October 13 that it will let users exclude that music from search results too.
The French streaming service says it receives nearly 90,000 fully AI-generated tracks every day.
Meanwhile, Spotify is developing licensed AI music products of its own. In October 2025, it announced plans to build “artist-first” AI music products with Sony Music Group, Universal Music Group, Warner Music Group, Merlin, and Believe.
In May, Spotify struck licensing deals with UMG to let fans create AI covers and remixes of participating artists’ songs through a paid Premium add-on. It has since signed similar agreements for the tool with Merlin and Kobalt.
“This work isn’t finished,” said Spotify. “AI moves fast, and bad actors adapt just as fast.
“But as AI makes music more abundant, we believe listeners will value human artistry even more. Our job is to make Spotify the place they find it.”Music Business Worldwide