© AOQ 2026
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How do Spotify's most passionate listeners consume, create and connect through music?
In 2024, Spotify used their own platform data to identify their most engaged listeners. They believed they were tastemakers, young people ahead of the curve discovering artists before the mainstream caught up, and sharing them within their circles of influence. AOQ was asked to bring their data to life by spending time in their worlds and unearth who these people really were.
Our work began with a discovery phase across five US states in October 2024, before expanding into a second global phase between April and June 2025, spanning fifteen cities across the UK, Italy, Germany, Brazil and Mexico. In both phases, digital ethnographies and remote interviews laid the groundwork before we went into the field, spending time with our Muses in their homes, at their favourite hangouts and alongside their friends. What we found was more nuanced than what the data had originally suggested: not trendsetters in the traditional sense, but a generation of quiet creators, deeply passionate, building micro-worlds in their bedrooms and online communities.
Two interactive research reports bringing the Spotify Muse to life across markets. The first defined who they are: their values, traits and behaviours, distilled into a foundational profile. The second validated those findings globally, identifying what holds true everywhere while uncovering how the Muse expresses differently market by market. At the heart of the final deliverable was an interactive cultural ecosystem: an explorable archive of over a thousand creative outputs from Muses across all markets, spanning illustration, fan music, memes, digital interactions and physical artefacts. A navigable map of how the people who care most about music actually create and consume it.
Spotify
AOQ/018/022
The World of the Spotify Muse
How do Spotify's most passionate listeners consume, create and connect through music?
© Ask One Question 2026
Contact Us
How do Spotify's most passionate listeners consume, create and connect through music?
In 2024, Spotify used their own platform data to identify their most engaged listeners. They believed they were tastemakers, young people ahead of the curve discovering artists before the mainstream caught up, and sharing them within their circles of influence. AOQ was asked to bring their data to life by spending time in their worlds and unearth who these people really were.
Our work began with a discovery phase across five US states in October 2024, before expanding into a second global phase between April and June 2025, spanning fifteen cities across the UK, Italy, Germany, Brazil and Mexico. In both phases, digital ethnographies and remote interviews laid the groundwork before we went into the field, spending time with our Muses in their homes, at their favourite hangouts and alongside their friends. What we found was more nuanced than what the data had originally suggested: not trendsetters in the traditional sense, but a generation of quiet creators, deeply passionate, building micro-worlds in their bedrooms and online communities.
Two interactive research reports bringing the Spotify Muse to life across markets. The first defined who they are: their values, traits and behaviours, distilled into a foundational profile. The second validated those findings globally, identifying what holds true everywhere while uncovering how the Muse expresses differently market by market. At the heart of the final deliverable was an interactive cultural ecosystem: an explorable archive of over a thousand creative outputs from Muses across all markets, spanning illustration, fan music, memes, digital interactions and physical artefacts. A navigable map of how the people who care most about music actually create and consume it.
Spotify
AOQ/018/022
The World of the Spotify Muse
How do Spotify's most passionate listeners consume, create and connect through music?
© Ask One Question 2026
Contact Us
How do Spotify's most passionate listeners consume, create and connect through music?
In 2024, Spotify used their own platform data to identify their most engaged listeners. They believed they were tastemakers, young people ahead of the curve discovering artists before the mainstream caught up, and sharing them within their circles of influence. AOQ was asked to bring their data to life by spending time in their worlds and unearth who these people really were.
Our work began with a discovery phase across five US states in October 2024, before expanding into a second global phase between April and June 2025, spanning fifteen cities across the UK, Italy, Germany, Brazil and Mexico. In both phases, digital ethnographies and remote interviews laid the groundwork before we went into the field, spending time with our Muses in their homes, at their favourite hangouts and alongside their friends. What we found was more nuanced than what the data had originally suggested: not trendsetters in the traditional sense, but a generation of quiet creators, deeply passionate, building micro-worlds in their bedrooms and online communities.
Two interactive research reports bringing the Spotify Muse to life across markets. The first defined who they are: their values, traits and behaviours, distilled into a foundational profile. The second validated those findings globally, identifying what holds true everywhere while uncovering how the Muse expresses differently market by market. At the heart of the final deliverable was an interactive cultural ecosystem: an explorable archive of over a thousand creative outputs from Muses across all markets, spanning illustration, fan music, memes, digital interactions and physical artefacts. A navigable map of how the people who care most about music actually create and consume it.
Spotify
AOQ/018/022
The World of the Spotify Muse