Rdio Launches In 20 New Countries, As 57% Of New Users Come From Outside U.S.

Streaming music provider Rdio has just launched its services in 20 new countries, making for a total reach of 51 different international markets. That’s more than rival Spotify, for those counting, which used to rival Rdio by exactly one after launching in four new countries back in September, for a total reach of 32 global spots. Rdio has seen its monthly active user growth from countries outside the U.S. grow from 30 percent at the start of 2013, to 57 percent by the end of the year.

The new countries in that group of 20 include much of Latin America, as well as parts of Europe and Africa, and members who sign up as new users in those markets will get free access to Rdio on the web for six months, and two weeks free trial on mobile. The service provides access instantly to Rdio’s library of over 20 million tracks, which features new releases every week. Rdio also recently launched greatly improved Rdio radio stations, which can be created from an artist, genre track or based on your collection.

Rdio has been facing challenges with its business lately, and laid off staff recently, including closing its regional Canada office entirely. Then in early December it named Amazon vet Anthony Bay as its new CEO. Bay took over for Drew Larner, who announced his intention to step down from the chief executive role earlier this year.

It’s been a long while since Rdio has announced anything in terms of subscriber numbers or MAUs, and the percentage increase reported today manages to tout some success without actually saying much, except for the fact that international growth appears to be what it considers a key element to its future success. Rival Spotify had about 24 million MAUs as of last count, and that Rdio rival is announcing something at a special event kicking off at 10 AM ET today, which we’ll be covering. That speaks volumes about the timing of this expansion announcement, which is likely designed to take some wind out of those Spotify sails.

Here’s a full list of the new countries where Rdio is launching today:

Argentina, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Hungary, Israel, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Monaco, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, South Africa, Uruguay, and Venezuela.