Spotify is bringing another format to listeners’ ears: narrated articles.
Starting Tuesday, more than 650 long-form magazine articles will be available (in English) to Spotify users where audiobooks are available. The curated collection of narrated articles, produced the Spotify Audiobooks in-house team, the includes stories from publications including Rolling Stone, The Atlantic, Vogue, Billboard, Vibe, GQ, Wired, Vanity Fair, Pitchfork and Variety.
The Spotify narrated articles are available within Premium subscribers’ monthly audiobooks allowance, alongside its existing audiobook library. Users on Spotify’s free tier can purchase individual articles for $1.99 each. Each narrated article is less than 2 hours long.
Articles from Variety available in the new section include Ramin Setoodeh’s “Ryan Gosling on Nearly Turning Down Ken” (available at this link on Spotify); Trish Deitch’s “The Confessions of Keri Russell” (at this link) and Daniel D’Addario’s cover story on Kate Winslet (at this link).
“With Articles, we’re introducing long-form journalism in audio as a natural extension of the music, podcasts, and audiobooks people already come to Spotify for, focused on topics we know they love,” said Colleen Prendergast, licensing lead for audiobooks at Spotify, in a statement. “By bringing shorter-form content into the mix, we’re meeting audiences where they are to help build healthy listening habits, ultimately growing engagement with books over time.”
