[All Platforms][Music] HiFi Quality - Lossless Streaming 16bit 44.1khz

[timiambeing]

I've just started a trial of Qobuz - they offer the standard 320kbps as well as lossless FLAC streaming (and high res downloads if you purchase them) the sound quality is noticeably better and on classical it's just wonderful to get all that resolution through your hi-fi or headphones! The catalogue has a way to go to get to Spotify's level, but they are getting there. The iPad app isn't' too bad (the desktop app is in need of an upgrade but I hear they are putting all their efforts into mobile apps right now).

So - lossless streaming - if Qobuz can do it then so can Spotify, they must have the same source - and obviously if you are asking £20 a month then those record labels and distributors take enough notice to make the high res tracks available for streaming. What this all means is soon, very soon, we will get lossless streaming and closely followed by high res downloads - but if Spotify aren't careful it will be Apple who get there first with an audiophile premium offering, and when they do it will be a much harder market place to make money in!

** please don't lump this suggestion with the main one on lossless downloads, that's a different idea entirely guys!

[timiambeing]

I've just started a trial of Qobuz - they offer the standard 320kbps as well as lossless FLAC streaming (and high res downloads if you purchase them) the sound quality is noticeably better and on classical it's just wonderful to get all that resolution through your hi-fi or headphones! The catalogue has a way to go to get to Spotify's level, but they are getting there. The iPad app isn't' too bad (the desktop app is in need of an upgrade but I hear they are putting all their efforts into mobile apps right now).

[timiambeing]

So - lossless streaming - if Qobuz can do it then so can Spotify, they must have the same source - and obviously if you are asking £20 a month then those record labels and distributors take enough notice to make the high res tracks available for streaming. What this all means is soon, very soon, we will get lossless streaming and closely followed by high res downloads - but if Spotify aren't careful it will be Apple who get there first with an audiophile premium offering, and when they do it will be a much harder market place to make money in!

[tts42572]

What is this "basic family" plan without audio books?  I'm not seeing that as an option.  All I have is premium family plan for $19.99/mo.

I'd love to save a couple bucks a month and get rid of audiobooks as I don't use that feature at all.

Planning to download tidal and test it out to see how it works.  I know I could save a few bucks a month with their family plan compared to spotify and get higher quality streaming.  I really would rather stay with spotify but not sure it makes much sense anymore when you can get a higher quality experience for cheaper.

[robigouk]

here's a link to an article I found, it's been removed but i'm currently on
Basic Family for £17.99 per month.

https://www.techradar.com/audio/spotify/spotifys-cheaper-music-only-tier-appeared-and-disappeared-in...

[tts42572]

Nice...Thanks for sharing.

Hopefully that rolls out soon for all of us users that don't want audiobooks.

Still irritated there is no HIFI option yet though!  

[Samppa3]

It would only be suitable that they offered Basic Hifi matching the price of their competitors.

[bzero]

in Switzerland they do not yet have a secondary family plan. Only Family
Premium so far.

[spinner_1]

Un saluto a tutti.

Dopo tanti anni mi sono fatto un abbonamento Premium sperando di trovare musica a qualità audio migliore. 

Purtroppo la qualità dei brani è molto bassa lontanissima da formati almeno Flac. Davvero deludente,

Dove si trova una sezione dove ci siao brani a qualità ascoltabile ?

Grazie

After many years I got a Premium subscription hoping to find music with better audio quality.

Unfortunately the quality of the songs is very low, very far from at least Flac formats. Really disappointing,

Where is there a section where there are listenable quality songs?

Thank you

Spinner

[tts42572]

Tried Tidal yesterday and pretty impressed.  Definitely hearing improved quality even on my crappy equipment....many songs just sound "fuller" or something.  Some songs it's very noticeable while others it isn't quite as noticeable.  I also noticed a huge difference using my Sony earbuds that support 360 audio.  

I also kind of enjoy that it's only music and my screen isn't cluttered with podcasts and audiobook tabs.  

And was super easy to just move all my playlists over using tune my music.

Still have 30 days of trial left so we'll see how it goes as I plan to keep listening to material on both platforms to make up my mind.  I personally don't care about social stuff, recommendations, etc.  I know what I want to listen to and just want to listen to it!

Frustrating.  I enjoy a lot about spotify but the lack of HIFI is really starting to bug me now that I've experienced what it could sound like.

[robigouk]

Just seen this article: - https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/spotify-to-launch-pricier-music-tier-that-includes-high-fidel...

[Jokke]

Due to competition, Spotify can't charge anything extra for Hifi.

By the way, I'm off to Tidal...Bye bye...

[tts42572]

Yeah, I wouldn't pay $5 a month more for HIFI if you can just get it on Tidal.

Maybe their new price structure will be more add-on specific so that people can tailor their experience to what they want.  Somebody mentioned a basic plan above that would save some money if you didn't want audiobooks.  They should probably do the same thing with podcasts.  That would be a way to allow people to do more apples to apples comparisons with the other services.

For example, make the base "music only" plan with HIFI comparable to say tidal, amazon and apple for like $11-$12 per month.  But then charge people $2 or $3 extra month for podcasts and maybe another $2-$3 for audio books.  So if somebody wanted those features, then they'd "happily" pay a total of $15-$17 a month.  They'd be paying more than other services but also getting more.  The people that get irritated are the ones paying that much for stuff they don't use and just want high quality music.

Going to be interesting to see what happens.  Spotify is under the gun a bit after raising prices and the longer they wait to roll out HIFI, the more subscribers (current and future) will investigate other services.