Spotify Still Intends to Launch Delayed HiFi Lossless Plan, Just Don't Ask When

[MacRumors]

Spotify says it still plans to launch a lossless music experience, although when that will be and what form it will take still appear undecided.

It's been more than two years since Spotify announced it would introduce a "HiFi" premium tier that would give users access to a catalog of CD-quality music tracks. Originally it said the tier would go live by the end of 2021, but similar moves by rival streaming services upended Spotify's lossless strategy.

Since then, Apple Music has included lossless listening options as part of its standard subscription price, and Amazon has stopped charging extra for its lossless music library. That's made the idea of Spotify asking users to pay more for a like-for-like service sound a lot less reasonable.

"We announced it, but then the industry changed for a bunch of reasons," Spotify co-president Gustav Söderström said on Tuesday in an interview with The Verge. "We are going to do it, but we're going to do it in a way where it makes sense for us and for our listeners. The industry changed and we had to adapt."

"We want to do it in a way where it works for us from a cost perspective as well," Söderström continued. "I'm not allowed to comment on our label agreements, nor on what other players in the industry did, for obvious reasons," he added.

According to The Verge, Spotify HiFi has been ready to launch for more than a year, and Spotify employees have access to HiFi, but it was originally intended to cost more than the standard plan. Given Apple and Amazon's moves, Spotify's lossless is now expected to appear as part of a more extensive plan that includes access to spatial audio tracks and other perks to do with audiobooks and podcasts.

When the plan will arrive, however, is still unknown, with Söderström only able to confirm to The Verge that HiFi "is coming at some point."

Article Link: Spotify Still Intends to Launch Delayed HiFi Lossless Plan, Just Don't Ask When

 

[Dwalls90]

Spotify has been obnoxious with their cries of Apple's anti-competitive behavior while also not taking advantage of Apple's API's for native HomePod support. However, in my opinion, their algorithms to generate playlists and discover music is still the best in the industry. I also don't think the majority of users care about lossless quality... 320kbps is solid.

 

[ericwn]

The lack of the feature surely doesn’t seem to impact their business much.

 

[steve09090]

Spotify has been obnoxious with their cries of Apple's anti-competitive behavior while also not taking advantage of Apple's API's for native HomePod support. However, in my opinion, their algorithms to generate playlists and discover music is still the best in the industry. I also don't think the majority of users care about lossless quality... 320kbps is solid.

Spotify are certainly better at choosing playlists. But that’s where it stops.
And they are now introducing AI voice introductions to their premium subscriptions. Do people really want to hear an Ai generated dj instead of the music? Stupid stupid stupid.

Maybe they need to prioritise where they are spending everyone’s money.

 

[al.aiello]

I totally agree. But with my Marantz Streamer it would be great to hear lossless music.
Apple music is also lossless however ONLY via cable (headphones or USB) and not all network DACs or Streamers accept Ipod/iphone input. Apple music is laggy and crashes often. Amazon has a horrendous user interface and the obligatory integration with Alexa which with the Apple ecosystem is not the best! As soon as Spotify is HI FI it will have won the market!

 

[McWetty]

If the development team behind the Apple Watch app is working on Lossless, I’d estimate sometime around July… 2032.

 

[AirunJae]

"We were going to charge more for HiFi but then Apple and Amazon started including Lossless for free." That's the answer for why there's no HiFi yet.

 

[slplss]

Ok, whatever Spotify. How many years of your corporate gibberish before you’ll suppport HomePods, if ever?

 

[wanha]

"We were going to charge more for HiFi but then Apple and Amazon started including Lossless for free." That's the answer for why there's no HiFi yet.

Bingo! This isn't a technical issue, but a money one.

 

[xraydoc]

Now that my Tesla supports Apple Music, I've got even less reasons to keep Spotify.

 

[one more]

Not that HiFi matters much for people using AirPods, EarPods, Beats or any other Bluetooth gear for that matter. It also introduces a much greater lag when streaming, so the only real benefit of HiFi is for people with dedicated HiFi equipment who want the maximum immersion into their sound.

Other than that, app aesthetics aside (as this is very individual), I still find Spotify better than Apple Music for its main task, which is playing & discovering music. I regularly retry Apple Music, but still cannot find a reason to switch.

 

[Odan]

I see no loss here, I used to have a "premium" account with them, the quality was not so premium and now I see that they themselves admit they never had quality sound. Thanks for the confirmation, I'll stick with Apple music...

 

[AppleTO]

Typical users don’t understand or care.

Many subscribe to SiriusXM in their vehicle. If you have ever tried this, you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about.

 

[Nozuka]

Bingo! This isn't a technical issue, but a money one.

They expected only a small amount of users to upgrade to lossless. So it might very well be a technical issue.
If everyone suddenly has access to lossless, they will need a lot more bandwidth than they had planned for.

Although this article also makes it sound like they possibly made bad agreements with the labels. (or at least worse than the competition) Maybe they announced to the labels that they are going to charge more for lossless and they then asked for more money per lossless stream.

 

[Odan]

Now that my Tesla supports Apple Music, I've got even less reasons to keep Spotify.

Exactly, it works waaaay better too. I have a profile in two different cars and today I noticed it automatically went to the same album in the other car and the same song too. When Apple and Tesla work together, the best technology is the result.

 

[matrix07]

Why bother to wait? I just created a thread about how to properly listen to Hi-Res lossless on Apple Music today here.

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/a-great-video-about-using-apple-music-lossless.2383714/

All you need is a DAC & a pair of power speakers basically. (Oh and a used iPad 🙂)

 

[tcgjeukens]

The percentage of users that has playback equipement capable to distinguish between standard def and loss less is less than 5%.
A Marantz, Cambridge, Naim, Arcam, NAD, AudioLab streamer: yes. AirPods, Sonos, JBL teenage wear: nah.
Another dimension: the age group that can afford decent HiFi playback probably can't hear the difference because of age-ear-degeneration (you may want to test it here)
The marketing of loss less is more playing towards emotion than something you can hear/afford.

 

[gleepskip]

Not that HiFi matters much for people using AirPods, EarPods, Beats or any other Bluetooth gear for that matter. It also introduces a much greater lag when streaming, so the only real benefit of HiFi is for people with dedicated HiFi equipment who want the maximum immersion into their sound.

Other than that, app aesthetics aside (as this is very individual), I still find Spotify better than Apple Music for its main task, which is playing & discovering music. I regularly retry Apple Music, but still cannot find a reason to switch.

This is what keeps me at Spotify also. Their algorithms help with discovery and there are social communities around Spotify that Eddie Cue could only dream of having.

Spatial audio and "hi-fi" for music is like 3D for movies: most people don't care.

 

[contacos]

I am trying to shift to Tidal, especially since Tidal HiFi is only 79 Cent in Argentina 😅 but I always miss my weekly Spotify playlists and multi room streaming to my Echos 😬 therefore I am still using it as well.

Every streaming service seems to lack something.

1. Apple Music: simply too ugly with all the pink on white and you cannot seem to be able control music on one device playing on another device. With Spotify for example I can open the app on the iPhone and control the music playing on the TV or iPad. On AM I only get an „music is playing on another device“ error

2. Spotify: Audio books are a mess and trying too hard to put Podcasts in my face, which I don’t care about

3. Tidal: offline playlists don’t seem to update unless you open each playlist manually, only then does it start to download the updates.
Integration to Echo isn’t great (seems to work only via Bluetooth to a single device)

 

[Colpeas]

Frankly, I don't care about the lossless plan anymore. In car you can't tell the difference between 320kbps and lossless however hard you try and bluetooth headphones doesn't support lossless codecs to begin with.

 

[iBreatheApple]

Apple will send me a free trial every few months and I keep trying but I think Spotify is superior, most likely because I use it most so the algorhythm (CG) is perfected for me. Anyway, they started offering limited availability several years ago and I wish I could understand what the hold up for hifi Spotify could be. Unless they’re salty Apple’s is included as they intended to charge. Some people were offered +$5 and others +$10

https://techcrunch.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/spotify-hi-fi.jpg

 

[imnotthewalrus]

I use both Spotify and Apple Music, as each has their strengths.

 

[wanha]

They expected only a small amount of users to upgrade to lossless. So it might very well be a technical issue.
If everyone suddenly has access to lossless, they will need a lot more bandwidth than they had planned for.

Although this article also makes it sound like they possibly made bad agreements with the labels. (or at least worse than the competition) Maybe they announced to the labels that they are going to charge more for lossless and they then asked for more money per lossless stream.

A. Do you know for a fact Spotify "expected only a small percentage of users to upgrade to lossless"? Because that sentence sure sounds like a fact.

B. The article explicitly states that this isn't a technical issue (do you really think that in 2021/2022/2023 it takes two years to upgrade server capacity to meet the extra demand of upgrading the music to lossless?)

Rather, Spotify had planned to charge more for the feature, and now they can't because Apple and Amazon gave it away for free. It says so in the article, not once but twice.

C. Spotify already pays significantly less per stream than Amazon or Apple. See graphic below.

 

[J___o___h___n]

I'd rather have HomePod support

 

[Konigi]

Spotify is great for:

• promising things it doesn't deliver
• releasing features nobody asked for and will barely use
• removing features that users were using and want back

Unfortunately, it does have a powerful algorithm, and I keep discovering great music through it. It s*cks.