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Spotify Premium Users Get Lossless Streaming After Years of Delays

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Spotify has officially rolled out lossless audio streaming to Premium subscribers after years of delays. The feature, which was first promised in 2021, is gradually becoming available in 50 markets including the US, UK, Australia, and Germany.

Enabling-Lossless-from-Your-Profile.jpg.jpeg

Thankfully, Spotify includes lossless streaming at no additional cost for existing Premium members. That's particularly good news, since early rumors suggested Spotify would offer lossless as a higher-priced tier. Not so.

This probably has something to do with the fact that in the intervening years Apple decided to include lossless audio as part of its regular Apple Music subscription at no additional cost. Shortly after, Amazon Music, which previously charged extra for its HD tier, matched the move.

Spotify Premium users will receive in-app notifications when the feature becomes available and can enable it through the media quality settings. A lossless indicator also appears in the Now Playing bar when streaming high-quality audio. Spotify says nearly every song on the streaming service will be available in lossless, with a clearly labelled 'Lossless' symbol.

The service supports 24-bit/44.1 kHz FLAC files, though this falls short of Apple Music, Tidal, and Qobuz, which offer up to 24-bit/192 kHz. The lossless quality being played also appears in the Connect Picker for compatible hardware, which includes devices from Sony, Bose, Samsung, and Sennheiser at launch, with Sonos and Amazon integration expected next month.

Spotify says the lossless rollout will continue over the next two months across all supported regions. First reports that Spotify was working on a lossless audio version of its streaming service appeared almost eight years ago, when the company started testing the option with a small group of users.

Article Link: Spotify Premium Users Get Lossless Streaming After Years of Delays
 
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https://www.macrumors.com/2025/09/10/spotify-premium-users-lossless-streaming/
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Needs Atmos, this is a decade old half-measure.

Even for Stereo, Atmos offers higher headroom and less distortion and often, for the past few years or so, better mixes.

That first gen back in 2020 was very bad because they automated conversions but since then new releases have been pretty stellar across the board. Nearly all of my new music listening is in Atmos whether I'm in the car or using something that supports it / "Spatial Audio", using fixed position, obviously.

Glad it's not an additional cost, but unfortunate for Atmos producers and the millions of consumers who have devices capable of decoding it.
 
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novagamer said:
Needs Atmos, this is a decade old half-measure.

Even for Stereo, Atmos offers higher headroom and less distortion and often, for the past few years or so, better mixes.

That first gen back in 2020 was very bad because they automated conversions but since then new releases have been pretty stellar across the board. Nearly all of my new music listening is in Atmos whether I'm in the car or using something that supports it / "Spatial Audio", using fixed position, obviously.

Glad it's not an additional cost, but unfortunate for Atmos producers and the millions of consumers who have devices capable of decoding it.
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Atmos obviously has the potential to be amazing as we’ve seen in movies and TV shows, but I feel like for music it isn’t fully there yet. Most music production first happens in stereo since that’s how the song is mostly being played (stereo systems, headphones, car speakers). Then, producers try to take that track and mix it in Atmos for services like Apple Music. However, music is much harder to mix in Atmos versus movies because there are so many elements playing at the same time, whereas that isn’t the case in movies (mostly dialogue or singular sound effects). Additionally, since the population that’s listening to Atmos tracks is relatively low, Atmos production isn’t a huge focus point, especially for artists with a lower budget. The result is an Atmos track that’s technically great, but isn’t perfectly mixed (Example: Betty by AJR, released July 2025, piano part at 2 minutes is too quiet, immediately goes back into loud chorus).

sorry for the yap
 
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techyOS said:
Atmos obviously has the potential to be amazing as we’ve seen in movies and TV shows, but I feel like for music it isn’t fully there yet. Most music production first happens in stereo since that’s how the song is mostly being played (stereo systems, headphones, car speakers). Then, producers try to take that track and mix it in Atmos for services like Apple Music. However, music is much harder to mix in Atmos versus movies because there are so many elements playing at the same time, whereas that isn’t the case in movies (mostly dialogue or singular sound effects). Additionally, since the population that’s listening to Atmos tracks is relatively low, Atmos production isn’t a huge focus point, especially for artists with a lower budget. The result is an Atmos track that’s technically great, but isn’t perfectly mixed (Example: Betty by AJR, released July 2025, piano part at 2 minutes is too quiet, immediately goes back into loud chorus).

sorry for the yap
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It's alright, there are bad examples for sure but much less than there were. Taylor Swift's albums are better in Atmos, even in Stereo, just quieter due to the fold-down. Metallica's 72 Seasons is significantly better in Atmos in Stereo because the cymbals were mixed too high in the Stereo version and sound really bad, the extra headroom helped fix that.

I listen to quite a bit of new music and across the board I'd say it's a dramatic improvement. It frustrates me that they aren't even providing the option to consumers, but yeah certainly people without Apple headphones or HomePods are for the most part not using it, although I do have a friend who uses their high-end soundbar to listen to music in Atmos too.
 
I have no interest in lossless, but it's a nice addition for those of us on Spotify. Maybe someday I'll hook my phone to my floor stereo with a cable.

Still can't stand Apple music, despite having tried to several times, and for several months.

DEMinSoCAL said:
It's very odd you'd be urging people to go back 40 years in time.
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I still physically buy a lot of music, and movies. It doesn't disappear when you stop paying...subscriptions suck, across the board..no exceptions.
 
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abatabia said:
Better late than never I guess. Still not anywhere near as good as Apple Music or YouTube music.
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I've really come to love YouTube Music ... admittedly largely because it's included in something I want and pay for anyways (YT Premium).

I'm still a music buyer whenever able, so YTM is a great complement as it's unmatched for music discovery and research. One can find basically everything in some quality or another. Sometimes the killer feature is just "having everything".
 
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Everyone was waiting apple to go all in with the new iPhone to release all the long awaited features. Blackmagic with ProRes Raw and now Spotify with lossless.
 
SilmarilFinder said:
Although they’re very late to the party, I still don’t see the point of this, especially if you’re listening on AirPods, car speakers (yes even from the high end B&O speakers) or the built in speakers on your phone, iPad or laptop.
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Quite right. Anything with a Bluetooth link in the chain is not going to deliver the bit rate needed. Even if you pull losses from Spotify's servers, it will be transcoded to a lower quality/bit-rate prior to transfer over Bluetooth.

There is a point, though, if you're not running over Bluetooth. Wired connections (digital and analogue) will carry lossless quality right through to your DAC and speakers.
 
SilmarilFinder said:
Although they’re very late to the party, I still don’t see the point of this, especially if you’re listening on AirPods, car speakers (yes even from the high end B&O speakers) or the built in speakers on your phone, iPad or laptop.
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Exactly. Those who cared about this aren't doing music streaming like this anyway. Its a tick on a box for these services when the majority of people are listening on earpods.
 
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turbineseaplane said:
I've really come to love YouTube Music ... admittedly largely because it's included in something I want and pay for anyways (YT Premium).
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I can't say I am a fan of the service, but like you said, there's there, it's free as part of premium, and it gets the job done. I wish google would update it to better support native iOS features like shortcuts support and split-screen multitasking though.
 
Until AirPlay 2 is implemented like they promised years ago I will not use Spotify again. The music constantly drops
 
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