Plays
Plays accumulate per track and stay. A track from two years ago still carries the count it earned.
4 services available
Services for Spotify
Spotify shows four different numbers on an artist page and they measure four different things. Each service below has its own page with the packages, the rate and the delivery window that apply now.
Monthly Listeners
Unique accounts in a rolling 28-day window. It measures recent activity, not a career total, and it falls back.
Followers
Followers get your releases in their Release Radar, so the number affects how a new track starts.
Playlist followers
Ordered against a playlist link rather than an artist link. A playlist with followers is a distribution asset.
Before you choose
The number most people mean when they talk about a Spotify artist is monthly listeners, and it is the one most often misunderstood. Monthly listeners counts unique accounts that played you in a rolling 28-day window. It is not plays, it does not accumulate, and it falls back down when the window moves past a release. An artist page showing a high figure is showing recent activity, not a career total.
Plays are the opposite: they accumulate per track and stay. A track that did well two years ago still carries its play count.
Followers are a third thing again. A follower gets your releases in their Release Radar, so the number has a mechanical effect on how a new track starts, which neither plays nor monthly listeners have.
Playlist followers are their own order and go against the playlist link, not the artist link. A playlist with followers is a distribution asset; an artist page with followers is an audience. They are not the same purchase.
Worth knowing before you decide: a number on the artist page is what a listener sees, but a label or a curator looking properly will open all four, and the relationship between them is what they read.