When will the automatic audio quality change when streaming via wifi or mobile connection?

[jorisvann]

Plan

Premium

Country

 NL

Device

(iPhone , iPad)

My Question or Issue

 When you choose the automatic audio quality level, it chooses the audio quality depending the type of connection you have. 

I would like to know when streaming as a premium user, when will it choose the highest or medium level when using mobile connection of wifi/broadband?

Is there an overview of what the prerequisites are to determine the audio quality bitrate output level? Is that based on type of connection or connection quality? 

Is there a difference when using wifi or a mobile data connection? (broadband at home can sometimes be hampering or when 4G then automatic highest level?)

Thank you

[Loxer]

Hey @jorisvann, Welcome to the Community.

Hope you're doing great!

It depends on the connection quality. The usage will be the same in both wifi or mobile data, but to save your data you can use this article for some tips.

Here's another support article to learn more about audio quality settings in various systems.

Have a great day! 🙂

[jorisvann]

Dear Lori1607,

Thank you for your reply and sharing the links to the information pages. Those pages I have already seen, but I am not concerned about my data streaming usage.

I just would like to know, what is the quality that I hear when I am in the car and streaming? (then I use 4G, will I get then the highest quality) When my connections fails or go to 3G, will it drop then in quality? (or what are the conditions to drop in quality?) 

What happens at home when I use my wifi? Which quality? And again if my broadband connection is going bad or my children start watching movies online simultaniously, what will then be the quality? At home I connect to bluetooth speakers, so I think i do not use connect or am I?

When knowing above information, then I can think whether I would like to download some music offline in a better quality or not. The standard is normal, but above there are the option of high or very high. So I would like to compare this to my streaming quality. For situations when my connection goes bad or I am in an offline situation like in an airplane. (and I do not have endless data storage capacity on all my devices, so there is my challenge)

So I think it is fair that Spotify reveils some of their business rules when using automatic streaming quality. For now the answers in the help section are explaining the data streaming usage, but what quality when is chosen is not shared. I do not think it should be a big secret. 

Thanks again for the help. May be Spotify itself can reach out for an answer.

[Givemepizza]

Hey

I would like to know too. It would be cool if you reply. And your support link doesn’t work.

[jorisvann]

I do not know yet. Spotify keeps silent and apparently does not share this info. They are only concerned on the data usage. Explaining what music quality you would get in an automatic setting with different connections seems not to be their priority. I still hope to learn about it.

[Jeremy]

Hi there folks,

Thank you for your replies in this thread. We just came across this thread.

We really hope that this article can give you more information about audio quality.

If you feel like you need more information regarding this, just let us know and we'll be happy to continue the conversation 🙂

We'll keep an eye out for a possible reply.

Take care!

[jorisvann]

Dear Jeremy,

I also know this article, but that does not answer my question. However it highlights the black box again for which I want to know what is inside: "Automatic: Dependent on your network connection"

So when in automatic setting: what audio quality do I get when I have spotify premium and I am using my fixed internet connection of 30 Mbps? Or in case the whole family is streaming Netflix and my bandwith drops to 5Mbps?
What if I use my 4G connection. What audio quality will I get?

Is there a table available for these settings?

Thank you community or Spotify if you can solve this question.

[Kiril]

Hey there @jorisvann,

Thanks for your response.

The Automatic option that you saw listed in the article gives the app the freedom to switch dynamically between the Low, Normal and High options, depending on your internet connection and bandwidth volume. This is similar as to how other streaming apps and platforms work as well. So if your bandwidth gets limited a lot, then the app will chose to stream in a low audio quality, to ensure you'd still get a decent listening experience for the time being. 

Hope this clears things up. If you have any questions or need anything else, the Community is here for you.

[jorisvann]

Dear Kiril,

Thank you for your effort to explain, but my questions is still unanswered and the same: I want to know the matrix that determines the "Low, Normal and High options".

At which combinations of Internet Connections and Bandwidth will it jump to the different audio quality options?

I was hope somebody knows and is willing to share that.

[Kiril]

Hi again @jorisvann,

Thanks for your answer.
 

Honestly, we don't have such a matrix to share with you. What we know is that the Spotify app determines the audio quality on the fly (i.e. automatically) based on a ping and bandwidth status. Anything above 2Mbit/s, provided those are maintained consistently and without drops should be sufficient for High streaming quality, but will ultimately depend on the current connection stability and your device's performance.

Hope you find this useful. Keep us posted if you need help with anything else.