Option to stream in Lossless quality while keeping lower download quality

[Viggohendriks]

Dear Spotify team,

I really enjoy using Spotify, but I’ve run into a frustrating limitation with the quality settings.

At the moment, I can set download quality and streaming quality separately, but once a track is downloaded, Spotify will always play the downloaded version — regardless of the streaming quality I’ve selected.

This means that if I download my music in High Quality (to save storage space), I can no longer listen to that track in Lossless over Wi-Fi — even though that’s exactly what I’d like to do.

It would be a huge improvement if Spotify allowed:

• downloads to remain at a lower quality, but
• automatically stream the lossless version when on Wi-Fi.

This way, I could save space on my device while still enjoying the full lossless experience whenever possible.

I hope you will consider adding this feature in a future update, as it would significantly improve the listening experience.

[tunedIN]

Hello, 

Has anyone tried turning off/on Settings Apps>Devices>Local audio files

I would think that by turning this 'off' you are telling Spotify not to play inferior recorded quality tracks when streaming over wifi. Or by turning this 'on' you are telling Spotify to play your Hi Res downloads instead of streaming them over mobile data. I could be wrong, but what if I'm not.

MateusM are you please able to confirm? 

What I  do know is having this turned 'off' doesn't affect 'Offline mode'

[Daniel2222]

@tunedIN No, that toggle only affects audio files that you manually imported to appear in your Spotify App(eg .mp3 files from some small SoundCloud artist).

[tunedIN]

Thanks Daniel2222

I appeciate your clarification. 

[showgirI]

ok so it's obviously not an ideal fix, but my current workaround is using one device for lossless and the other for download quality (in my case very high). I only use offline mode when i'm out without a wifi connection, so when i'm sat in one place i'll use my laptop to play lossless.

[tunedIN]

Hi showgirI

Thanks for sharing your workaround. Like you, I go offline when away from WiFi. I have my favourite playlist downloaded in hi-res. 100 tracks, 5.5 hours long & uses just over 3 GB of storage. 

3 GB of storage is better than 3 GB of data. It's easier on battery life and the CPU. Listening to hi-res all the time is better than switching in and out. 

When it comes to any kind of storage, let's say physical, for example. If you haven't opened a box in years, it's time to let it go. Data storage is no different, except data can be backed up.

[Zooky]

Fascinating how the multi-year-long project of lossless turned out to still be rushed in its implementation. This is such an obvious oversight.

[שקד]

It's a good idea, but also so that it doesn't happen the other way around. When I'm using cellular data on low quality and I have a lossless download, it should not play in the quality of cellular data.

[jamiescottie1]

Agree with all the previous commenters here... This seems like such a no-brainer I honestly just assumed this to be case until I noticed now the "lossless" tag not showing up on my phone when playing downloaded songs.

Please implement!

[lukadjukic22]

Genuinely pisses me off. I don’t know what to do. If they don’t figure this out soon I’m seriously going to have to switch to Apple Music. 

[adriendevoe]

I just can’t understand how a service as huge as Spotify hasn’t thought of such a basic feature. It’s literally the bare minimum for user experience, it makes no sense.