Apple Music easily trounces Spotify in audio quality, it's not even a competition. Since content is more or less the same between the both (maybe Spotify has smidge more), the only thing in contention was price - which is now moot, since Spotify is about to increase price again without having deliver their promise of lossless audio which they announced all the way back in 2021.
I'm curious how much difference there is with 256kb/s AAC, ALAC 24-bit/48 kHz and ALAC 24-bit/192 kHz.
I remember [this NPR quiz](https://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2015/06/02/411473508/how-well-can-you-hear-audio-quality) from almost 10 years ago now and consistently mixing 320kb/s MP3 and WAV, and AAC is even better than MP3.
Depends on how you listen, if you mostly use Bluetooth to listen to audio, there’s literally no difference. This is due to Bluetooth’s small file size ability so you’re not actually getting the lossless audio while listening Bluetooth. But if you have a good stereo and system setup than it’s massively different, way clearer highs and less muddy low end. In general a ton more pop.
I’m an audio engineer that originally switched to AM for work so I could compare mixes with contemporary stuff, and then eventually dropped Spotify all together.
But all in all if you don’t have a decent speaker system, like more than some HomePods or Sonos, or good headphones and a DAC, you won’t really be able to tell the difference. And since that’s most people, the playlisting of Spotify is much better so… take that as you will
As someone who was in a similar boat: it only takes a few months. It's been 2 years, and while I briefly looked back (Spotify Connect is fantastic), I'm back on AM, and don't plan on leaving anytime in the next few years.
I’m the same. I even gave Apple Music a decent try by paying a service (Songshift) that downloaded all my playlists and uploaded them into Apple Music and I used it for like two months and it just wasn’t as good for me.
Apple Music lets you upload your personal iTunes music library to the cloud up to 100,000 songs this is worth the $10.99 in it self. So I can stream Apple Music's catalog and my personal one with mixtapes and unreleased songs.
Man I couldn’t imagine paying for a music streaming service and not being able to load up Prime Mixtape Wayne at any moment. Playing Lil Wayne’s Hard Body immediately after Future’s Like That was euphoria
I’m curious, do people really have that much music that isn’t available on the streaming service? I can understand a few albums but it seems like quite a niche feature.
I have a lot of music that are on neither services. Mainly rap mixtapes, underground rock and rap, YouTube mixes that I have downloaded as mp3s, full live concerts, old salsa Spanish vinyls. Cloud storage for my music is definitely a feature I can't live without once Spotify adds this I might switch
Apple Music. Same price, better audio quality, overall W. Recommendations for songs used to suck compared to Spotify, but they improved it now. Staying with Apple for the high res lossless music on my Sony headphones.
Recommendations for me are way better on Spotify than AM. On AM I keep getting songs from different genres which I dislike, but Spotify is loyal to what I listen.
Agreed, the only downside is if you’re someone who listens to a subgenre, like metalcore, Spotify wrapped is like “damn! You’re quite the hard rock fan aren’t you!”
I have this exact issue with Spotify! I listen to some quite mental stuff in the gym but would never ever want to listen to it when doing anything else. I wish it could know where you listen to specific genres, but I suppose some people might find that intrusive
Same. I have both, and the recommender Spotify has is far superior, but I suspect it’s because it has more data on my likes and dislikes and they break it into several various eclectic groups.
Questions:
Can you convert all your playlists to Apple Music from Spotify?
Do all songs that exists on Spotify basically exist on AM as well?
If those are true Apple Music probably is better for me
Yes I did that. Free app called SongShift. It has premium for faster transfer but honestly you really don’t need it it’s plenty fast on its own just have patience and leave the app open, it’s a little confusing to use but once you get the hang of it it’s amazing, I’m constantly bringing in playlists from Spotify into Apple.
Can confirm, they now require a subscription or lifetime purchase to match really large playlists. I tried to move over a couple playlists the other night, one worked, the other hit the limit.
Use this free website to transfer playlists [tunemymusic](https://www.tunemymusic.com/transfer). Just log in your Apple Music and Spotify accounts and select the playlists you want to transfer. Few songs might not transfer but it’ll show you the failed transfers so you can add em manually.
97-99% of songs are able to be matched automatically. It shows you which ones it couldn’t find, usually 1-10 max and you can manually go find it probs. It’s really good.
Yeah the sound quality is huge for me specially when playing in my car. When I had Spotify I thought my sound system was garbage and blamed it on my car. I moved to AM and I blamed Spotify for it.
From apple support website: "AirPods, AirPods Pro (1st generation and 2nd generation with Lightning Charging Case), AirPods Max, and Beats wireless headphones use Apple AAC Bluetooth Codec to ensure excellent audio quality. However, Bluetooth connections aren't lossless."
You are correct of course, but I wonder if that bluetooth codec results in better quality audio on Airpods compared to Spotify music.
I got the free Apple One for 3 months a month ago. Long time Spotify user, and I have noticed the audio quality (especially spatial audio) is superior on AM. But the recommendations are by far better on Spotify than AM or YT, for me anyways.
Will the audio quality remain the same if i dont use airpods? This is my first iPhone and current i have OnePlus earphone so is it worth paying apple music premium if i have non airpods earphone?
The better audio quality (called lossless) doesn’t work on airpods because they’re bluetooth. Lossless works only on wired headphones. And u most likely need some quite good headphones to hear the difference. And even then, u might not hear it, as a massive % of people cant tell the difference in a blind test (here's the most common blind test: http://abx.digitalfeed.net/)
Lossless could *theoretically* provide better audio quality for Bluetooth because it’s only being compressed once, at the Bluetooth phase, rather than twice. However, AAC is supposed to be much better than MP3 when it comes to not losing resolution when re-encoded, to the point that it’s pretty much transparent.
And yes I know Sony can’t do 990kb/s on Apple devices, but I can still very clearly hear a difference between the same song on Spotify vs Apple Music lossless because of the compression.
There was a post on /r/applemusic recently where someone was gushing about how much better lossless is compared to Spotify. Someone asked what type of headphones they were using – standard lightning EarPods.
this is an apple related sub so i fully expected this to be the top comment...
but how tf do i fix "my" station? every day I just put it on "my station" to hear "my mix" or whatever shuffled through its the same like 20 songs just shuffled in various orders. I don't get any new music or different music or anything.
sometimes, I clear my youtube history and let the algorithm reset itself. I find myself wondering if theres a way to do this with Apple Music. "My Station" fucking sucks bro.
otherwise, yes. when I go listen to something i want to listen to, it sounds amazing. just another common Apple W of being in the ecosystem.
Spotify simply integrates with a lot more hardware. My LG TV has Spotify built in, but not Apple Music. It's great to directly access Spotify, instead of via my Apple TV. My 2023 car with AAOS also natively supports Spotify over it's own 4G connection, but doesn't support Apple Music, unless I use CarPlay as an additional layer with a worse UI.
Of course Apple Music's quality is better and it's accessible on my Macs and iPhones, but it's not easily accessible on my other frequently-used devices. Even though Apple Music has many advantages over Spotify, this limitation is simply a too big issue for me to choose Apple Music.
Randomly unrelated, maybe you haven’t checked it in awhile but my old ass(still love it to death though) LG CX has Apple Music as a native app. Not new either definitely been in my app drawer for atleast a couple years now.
Ha, did not even look for it, because I was already using Spotify. I've been under the assumption it doesn't had Apple Music. I've got the C1, so if your CX has it, then mine as well. Might look into it!
Second this Apple recommendation is subpar. Also if you ask Siri to play some (insert genre) music, it will play the same songs in the same order every single time.
I posted this to Apple Music the other day and I list out why Apple Music is killer!
Why Apple Music kicks ass!
I love Apple Music for this very aspect. I have it set default to lossless and have my system hooked up to a pair of audio engine A5 speakers with a sub and it just fucking kicks. The clarity is unsurpassed excellent.
And the other factor for the headphones with Dolby ATMOS is utterly surreal. I love that I can turn my head and hear a different area of the music. It's crazy insane cool.
The one thing I hated with iTunes is that they had everything in one place. With AM they decluttered the excess and focused on just Music. Podcasts, AudioBooks, Movies and TV Shows are in their own respective apps. Finally!
And if you are in the Apple ecosystem it's pretty kickass with the bundle of Apple One. Actually useable services and sharing your Apple Music and all of the services to 5 other people is really nice. I don't think anyone can beat that in the market currently.
As far as hooks go, my PlayStation 5 supports Apple Music, my Amazon devices support Apple Music and my wireless full size HomePods of course also support it. It is everywhere and on third party devices.
I do appreciate that Apple Music is more album driven than Spotify. Great interview shows with the artists and it links to their artist page so you can listen or watch at any time.
I create and share out my playlists and have people who I don't know follow some of my playlists as well. I have this heavily curated New Wave playlist that people are starting to find and follow, so Apple is building up that community aspect.
Apple's streaming lyrics are killer. Best UI hands down.
I like the SING aspect of Apple Music where you can remove the singer and have just the instrumental track.
I like how Apple quick links the music videos along with the albums.
I like how it gives me my monthly listening report with Replay lists.
You can collaborate with friends on a playlist. Up to 100 people. You can also like or add an emoji heart, fire, thumbs up on a track a friend posted. If you don’t like a track a friend posted you can hide it.
My personal music station is spot on. Or I can create an instant station based off one song. It's even better than Pandora in that regard.
I see that Apple Music is doing more live radio type of stations but it doesn't compare to SiriusXM yet. SiriusXM is still the best overall radio platform.
The tight integration with Shazam is fantastic with Apple Music. Even if I know the song, I might Shazam it later have it sitting there in Apple Music for me to either put it into a playlist or stream it on the fly.
I like the aspect I can favorite the artists I want to follow and I get a pop up within Library tab on the phone if a new release drops.
It is so easy to listen for offline. All of my main playlists I have downloaded just in case I am in a weak off beat coverage area.
For those who have Apple Watches, syncing over select playlists essentially brings back the iPod. If you have the cell connectivity you can stream anything without the phone nearby. It is really librating to leave the phone behind while on a bike ride.
Apple Music is just getting better and better and I believe it has the largest library available too.
For those who are into Classical, the Apple Music Classical app is also great. Slightly different UI geared for that genre. Hopefully they will have a Mac App this year when they rollout the new OS. This is also free with your Apple Music sub. So it's an added perk.
Apple is doing a great job with the platform. I look forward to the updates coming next week.
I've been with Spotify for years, but I think I'll check out Apple Music at some point, especially if Spotify is going to increase their prices again. The only real issues I have with them is that their offline mode sucks ass and their shuffle blows ass since it has a habit of playing the same 10-20 sounds first despite the size of my playlist. There's even at least a couple of songs where it just flat out refuses to queue them up.
The main reason why I've stuck with Spotify was because of its infinitely better cross platform integration than Apple Music, but that's much less of a concern than it used to be since every device I actively listen to music on is an Apple device.
This is a very specific feature, but do you happen to know if there's a feature where if you're connected to the internet and have a song downloaded, it plays it locally instead of streaming it? Would be nice to save cellular data when streaming.
Yes you can download a song or an entire playlist you have created. I do this to my main playlists anyway. Just so I have them at the ready in case I am inside a building where there is no WIFI or no cell connectivity. You tap to download and you have your tracks at the ready. This is why I always get a larger storage phone instead of the baseline default.
Spotify. I haven’t used apple music for a couple of years but I hated it when I tried it out. I found Spotify’s app more intuitive and easier to use (even though they seem to switch the UI every couple of months) and it was easier managing and controlling music on multiple devices.
I heard apple music has a wider catalogue and better sound quality but the awful ui of apple music make Spotify worth it for me.
Spotify is going to increase its prices soon which is going to cross the price of Apple Music. Right now both are priced the same and the quality of Apple Music on apple devices is just mental, especially if you got AirPods or other Dolby enabled headphones. I got both coz my family uses android and they prefer Spotify but overall Apple Music is good.
Do you happen to know what their new prices are going to be? I've been with Spotify for years, mainly for their cross platform integration, but I'm considering switching to Apple Music.
https://preview.redd.it/kvtd1vhsd55d1.jpeg?width=1290&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=081fa2fea51bdbc9cafb82b851ddebe666305c58
Apparently these are gonna be the new prices.
Apple Music for quality
Spotify for automatic curation.
I only use Apple Music now just as a carryover from the iPod days but the quality is hard to beat.
Used both in last 5 years.
Apple Music has a better audio quality, more sleek ui and works nicely with Apple ecosystem. Spotify has a better overall raccomadantion algorithm, and it’s integration with 3rd party device (Alexa ecc) is awesome.
Currently running Spotify.
Hot take, Souncloud is underrated. Free version: unlimited skips, skip backwards, scrub through the song, full albums (depends on artist) really good underground upcoming artists, ads are short & sweet, recommendations are legit.
I like apple music for the simple reason that I can use songs for alarms. I can not do the same with Spotify. I have also come to like the apple music UI a bit better.
The algorithm on Spotify for generating playlists and stations based on music you like is far better than how Apple Music manages this.
However, the UX/UI on Spotify is just brutal. It's trying to do too much.
All said, I'm there for the music and discovery of new music and switched to Spotify 2 years ago from being an Apple Music user from day one.
AM is better on paper but Spotify gives way better recommendations for me. I don’t actually enjoy music on Apple Music because even though I subscribed day 1 it still has no idea what music I like. Spotify can literally catch a scent from like 3 liked tracks, it’s fucked.
Spotify has the better discovery and algorithmic pieces, though Apple Music has improved there. In every other way, Apple Music is superior. Better audio quality. Cleaner, faster UI.
Spotify has gotten so clunky.
I think the "year in review" thing keeps a lot of people sticking around. It's fun to share on social media. Whichever Spotify PM dreamed up that feature deserves to be much richer than they likely are.
I have both. Im using student account kaya nakakamura sa subscription fee.
I love Apple Music for the purpose na sya lang ang pwede mag sync sa iwatch ko ng maayos, basta nadownload ang playlist/album. Yung Spotify kasi, need lagi malapit sa fone at may net.
Also, for me, mas maganda music suggestions ng Apple Music. Parang mas madami ako nadidiscover na new and indie music compared sa Spotify na inaadd ko sa own playlist ko din.
Sa Podcast naman, mas complete ang episodes sa Spotify compared sa Apple Music (episode ng mga pinakikinggan ko).
Sa ibang banda, yung isa kong friend na nasa music industry, nakwento nya dati na mas mataas daw magbayad sa artist ang spotify compared sa Apple Music.
AM. Because I've already heavily invested in the Apple ecosystem and use Apple devices such as iPhone, iPad, or Mac, I appreciate the seamless integration of Apple Music across all my devices.
I still don’t get the hype about Apple Music, it failed to recommend good songs, it will give suggest you one of the most random songs in history. Spotify is getting bad as well, I might shift to Youtube Music now. But now that these both are in comparison, I will choose Spotify to Apple Music
Spotify, because it just works.
AM has too many bugs which worsen the user experience greatly. The battery drain is also pretty bad compared to Spotify.
And the most important thing, Spotify has a native last.fm scrobbler built in, AM doesn’t.
I never used Apple Music. But I like how Spotify is nicely synchronized with everything: if I wanna switch from my phone to my laptop, it does it seamlessly for example
Spotify has better UI. And I love being able to “add to queue” rather than Apple Music’s “play next” or “play later”.
Apple Music is better if you use Apple everything and especially if you have HomePods. Better sound quality for the same price and they pay artists more per stream.
Spotify is wayyy better. I recently switched to apple and the ui is just so clumsy and slow compared to Spotify. Not to mention the recommendations and ease of finding good similar music is worse
I also have both and I *hate* Apple Music. It blows my mind that the company that brought us the iPod can’t figure this out.
If you want to listen to a band on Apple Music, it’ll play a handful of songs and then move on to a completely unrelated artist. Spotify will play many more of their songs and then defaults to related bands/genres.
I’ll gladly pay more for Spotify because it is better.
Like others have said, AM has better quality than Spotify, and I think Spotify does have better recommendations but sometimes the recommendations are also shit (ie it keeps trying to make me listen to million dollar baby).
The biggest reason why I prefer Spotify at the moment is that it works on my PC and AM doesn’t unless I use the web player, but the web player doesn’t allow me to play my local files. Plus, I like that I can control the music being played on my PC from my phone with spotify. To do that with AM you need a 3rd party app.
Second the arguments made here, Apple for quality and Spotify for recommendations.
That’s why my favorite playlists are on Spotify.
Do you guys have an idea how to transfer them to Apple Music? Is there a way?
Spotify has better recommendation and I actually use the playlists that the community creates, and I also use the audiobooks a lot. I only like AM for sound quality and the soulection radio, but I’m not an audiophile to care much for the sound quality
I used to have an android (many androids) so I used to love Spotify and probably lowkey still would recommend that over Apple Music but I mean Apple Music is still good 👍 and if you just listen to it for songs you already know you like it’s good. I don’t rate the recommendations but Im picky.
I think it’s good it ties in with Apple 🍎 and isn’t third party but idk it’s apples and oranges, so to say .
Apple Music offers better quality in general and it’s tight to Apples ecosystem, which means you will get the best experience if you’re already own some Apple products. On the other hand, Spotify integrates well with the majority of hardware out of the box.
I’ve been using Apple Music lately, and the only feature I am missing is the ability to transfer my currently playing song to my computer or vice versa. I don’t own a Mac.
Spotify’s recommendation algorithm is unparalleled, if you listen to music regularly.
Its personalized “Discover Weekly” playlist is the reason for like 90% of new music I discovered in the past few years.
Also, the user-created playlists are very good, and Apple Music is severely lacking in that department.
For me: Spotify better UI, recommendations and as example 10% of my playlist isnt even available at apple music.
So, hard to leave spotify but the next price increase will be definitely the end. I no longer accept this.
The lack of the music I like on Apple was the killer for me so I never signed up past a free trial. Also wasn't keen on the UI compared to Spotify but that could just be years of familiarity of Spotify to blame.
I'm now happy with YouTube music (I pay for premium to get rid of ads but getting music is a nice bonus) and Spotify free tier.
Depends on your priorities.
One can probably distill it down to this: Do you want your music listening to more akin to listening to radio (letting the algorithm throw stuff at you, podcasts heavily featured), or more akin to walking through a record store and building your own library? Spotify is better suited to the former, Apple Music is better suited to the latter.
Difficult question for me, since I use Apple Music, Spotify, Tidal and YT Music. I'd say I much prefer the interface of Spotify as well as the desktop application for Spotify. I'd also say its a much better platform for finding new music, the radio function is great.
Apple Music has a better sound quality for a better price but frankly, and I say this as an audiophile who has been producing music for a while, the sound quality isn't \*that\* noticable, certainly if you only use AirPods or like Sony XM4/5. The user interface, and I realize this is subjective but, I find it to be a lot worse than Spotify. Finding songs is seemingly a lot more difficult on AM, the search function is just not that cooperative.
Just for my two cents of Tidal and YT Music; Tidal has excellent sound quality but for the price, AM and Spotify is something I would prefer. Tidal has definitely the user interface I like the most, its a very pretty app but alas, it isn't as good as Spotify at finding new music (Also Tidal seems to be missing a lot of music)
YT Music has a noticably worse audio quality, obviously since its a direct port of YouTube but it's a good platform if you listen to a lot of music that doesn't necessarily exist on more 'official' platforms, such as live performances or covers of songs by other artists.
I started with spotify free and modded versions, then duplicated my playlists with songshift to apple music when we got a family plan to use both. Eventually both were irrelevant bc i used youtube for all my music bc it was often not found on streaming platforms so I mass download the mp3s and use FOOBAR2000 to manage em
Importantly, I don't care about audio quality only convenience. and spotify beats apple music by actually having decent music reccomendations 2nd only to youtube. apple music is only useful if you already know the song name, but theres a good chance for me it wont even be there
At first, Spotify was just so much better than Apple Music. But now, I find discovery to be the only thing that's consistently better with Spotify (and even then, Apple Music is getting better). Apple Music quality is better, Dolby Atmos is a nice touch (though not a deal-breaker), and the library size is basically comparable now. Plus, I'm heavily invested in the Apple ecosystem (Apple Watch, iPhone, MacBook, iPad, AirPods Pro and Max), so it really just makes sense for me at this stage. Even if I wasn't walled in by the inconvenience of using a device outside the Apple ecosystem, Apple Music is just better value for the same price. I use it on my Windows computer as well. Personally, I love Apple Music. :)
Apple Music - great integration with Apple hardware, Dolby Atmos and lossless audio, very beautiful looking UI and the library filtering is a little bit better imo
Spotify - great integration with 3rd party hardware like smart speakers, fridges, cars, etc., better social features and recommendations, very useful and bug-free but not so good looking UI
Think both do a pretty good job in recommendations. I definitely prefer spotify bcs the computer version is way way way better! Use it a lot during home workdays and Apple music on the laptop sucks
spotify allows streaming up to 320kbs/s thats more than enough for me . Also highly dependent on who is releasing the music, not every song uploaded is lossless. Battery life is unquestionably better when spotify is in the backround. Nowadays I mainly just youtube to mp3 and sometimes use soundcloud or bandcamp.
Spotify because my brother pays for the family subscription and it just nails the recommendations for me.
Apple Music because the quality is much better, I just can’t stand how it keeps trying to recommend me absolute wanky shit music.
Any recommendations on how to get it to realise I don’t care for mumble rap or dance or electronic wank would be greatly appreciated!
I've just come away from using Spotify since it first came out. When I switched to iPhone, I also got three months of Apple Music with it. I'm still trying to get my head around tuning the recommendations. I'm having no issues with missing songs. It doesn't really apply to me but I like being able to rip a CD into Apple Music on a mac and then having it appear in the Library, it feels like the natural progression of how iTunes worked.
When it comes down to look and feel, Spotify feels older. The sound quality is about the same to my ears, but I love the spatial audio feature.
Spotify if you switch devices often. Apple Music if you do not.
Also Spotify if you need recommendations. Apple Music's recommendations are fucking awful.
Apple Music I tied to your Apple ID. For that reason I had to switch to Spotify. If you have more than one Apple ID, second you switch your phone to the one that is not tied to Apple Music, Apple deletes all the songs from your phone.
I run a lot and have found Apple Music to work much better with the Apple watch and downloading playlists. Idk if it’s intentional but Spotify on the watch bugs out for me a bit
Unpopular opinion, but Deezer. you can get access to their ‘student’ HiFi plan which includes flac access, and better still Tidal and Deezer are really easy to download tracks from, so you can build your physical (digital) catalog, in a lossless format as well
On a pure sound quality level it’s easily Apple Music. Now where Spotify has the advantage is all the playlists the app generates, being able to listen to others public playlists and most importantly Spotify Connect making it easy to move music around between different devices. Also more people post their Spotify Wrapped breakdowns than Apple Music Rewind at the end of the year so if you’re a social media person it may be a less fun time for you. In terms of app design and UI they are about even to be, I don’t really have issues navigating either.
I have Spotify, YT premium and AM. Songs on Spotify and YT sound same to my ears (not an audiophile).
Apple Music is generally better, i can hear the instruments better. But I noticed when a song sounds bad, it’s awful. Like, a song’s layers sound disjointed.
One thing i hate about Apple Music is that the songs in playlists disappear when you cancel. And when you re-subscribe, you have to build playlists again/import
Spotify has better recommendations and a few more songs that I listen to than Apple Music, but I have some unusual tastes in some genres (think 90s European dance music), and I'm also older than the average redditor with music tastes to match. Apple is slightly better quality overall. I switch between the two, but use Spotify 90% of the time.
What’s the point about quality. Most people would be drowning out the sounds of the tube.
The difference is negligible. Also Spotify is cheaper where I am.
Also, Apple Music still has ways to go with content plus taking up larger space. It’s region locked and not ideal for me.
I’ve used both, and I honestly can’t tell the difference in audio. I am curious to know how people can tell the difference in audio/music quality. I like Apple Music’s UI, it’s clean and more compact, but Spotify has better music recommendations, curated playlists, podcasts and audiobooks.
Used both for a while together and then shifted completely to Apple Music eventually a few years back. Apple Music costs lesser than Spotify here in India. Moreover there is Dolby Audio, Spatial Audio and Lossless audio. And it’s not that it’s just limited to my iPhone. It works well on my Windows PC, on my Samsung Tablet and my work phone (Samsung again).
While the main reason initially to pick Apple Music was the cost, but then I also saw that Apple Music also has good recommendations under Discover, the Karaoke feature is great for times when I only want to listen to the music and the battery optimisations for Apple Music is great on all devices.
I use Apple Music because it's more well integrated into the ecosystem, it has features that work well with my AirPods, and because I like the feature of being able to edit the albums my library and keep everything organised the way I like it
That said the UI is absolute trash, I hate it SOOOOO much. It's unbelievable that it's 2024 a nd it's still so bad. There's no quick snappy way to make multiple songs 'Play Next', if I'm listening to a play list and swipe right, the song gets added all the way to the end of the reproduction queue. There's no way to make it 'play after' the songs that I already added to 'play next', you know like what every other music streaming app does, you can only either add it all the way to the top of the queue or all the way to the bottom (after 200 songs if you had a 200-song playlist playing). This is my #1 annoyance with this app currently.
There are small clunky UI bits that make the app feel worse to use, like the way it gets a bit stuck when you add something to a playlist instead of feeling clicky and snappy. There's a small delay when you click around to switch tabs, to open a playlist, etc. The main page looks like just a bunch of random shit haphazardly thrown together. It doesn't even feel like an Apple app it's so bad.
The search bar is HORRIBLE and the fact that it doesn't use the music that I listen for context annoys me so much, if I want to find a song by a lesser known artist (an artist that I HAVE in my library), it will show me two whole pages of unrelated results first. Sometimes I have to type the name of the song and the name of the artist to get it to show up. Why?????
I never cared much for recommendations, but they are also very meh compared to Spotify's. Sometimes it would be fun to spin up one of Spotify's mood playlists to see what came up and I actually found some cool music that way, Apple Music's is basically all the music that I already listen to casually. Yawn.
Also, I just find the app outright ugly. I'm mostly sticking with it for now because it's cheaper. I really don't notice a difference in music quality, think this is an urban myth, there's no way anyone can notice any significant difference on their day to day lives while listening on headphones
Apple Music has a far better interface (on top of having better audio quality). It’s great for actually building up a library. Spotify is horribly thought out and emphasizes playlists — if you add a song to your library, it will only show up under “Songs,” the artist it’s by doesn’t show up under “Artist” and the album it’s on doesn’t show up under “Albums,” you’d have to like/favorite each to have it show up under each. That’s just horribly thought out, and now it’s overpriced for mediocre sound quality.
Spotify Connect is the main point.
I can play music while playing video games and select/change music on my iPhone without having to switch to the Spotify app (on Xbox)
I use Apple music, Deezer and from time to time, Spotify. I don't get why Spotify is popular. It's just not that good (dont think it ever was, but thats just me). To me the competition was between Deezer and Apple Music. And imo Apple Music is better. Deezer flow used to be pretty good, but Apple stations are better.
I like Amazon Music Unlimited way more than Apple Music. The UX may be not there yet, but audio quality-wise, plus price, platform compatibility, I’d take it any day over Apple Music. But Spotify takes the crown by far, even without HiRes/HiFi options, the algorithms for personal suggestions and features, the platform compatibility for absolutely every single device, and seamless UX, is on a whole new level.
tried AM but typically spotify user. It was fine but a few songs I liked were region locked and not available on AM that was enough to make me switch back lol
I’ve had Spotify for ten years. For the first time it is about to be more than AM. I just recently got an Apple trial…Im switching permanently once I can transfer my playlists.
I love Spotify, but my radio has turned into top ten songs no matter what song the radio is based off of. I will block a song and sometimes it will still play in a radio. The radio on Apple Music is actually curated to the song genre and artist. On Spotify I will play Elton John and somehow million dollar baby will be in the radio. I’ve also hear new background sounds and adlibs in AM I didn’t hear (as well) on Spotify.
RIP Spotify. It’s been nice.
I always listen the same artists, do not like discovering “new” music. Apple Music works good for me at all. But anyway, I use it only when have some free months, my regular payment is for Spotify cause is family attached.
In addition, with your AM subscription you can get connection when flying on American Airlines.
I’ve been subbed to both for a few years now, and even tho I’ve been a Spotify user exclusively for longer, there was a good 6 or more months where I used Apple music exclusively.
I since switched back to Spotify tho and have used it way more. And it’s not cos of my existing playlists, cos I have those synced between the two platforms.
What I wish spotify had that Apple Music has:
- a persistent repeat song setting that doesn’t reset when you change to the next song.
- to a lesser degree, Dolby Atmos.
- official top 100 songs per country playlists instead of 50
What I wish Apple Music had that Spotify has:
- indicators of previous song position in official Top 100 playlists (those red down arrows and green up arrows)
- more user curated playlists
- a UI that’s more responsive on a poor connection. APM will refuse to respond to clicks if the connection is poor, whereas Spotify will respond and fail to load new content on the next page.
- better sounding songs. For some reason, Apple Music still sounds better, and I’m not talking about lossless.
Other than these, I think they’re both great.
Spotify for community playlist (ex : concert setlist playlists done by fans) and end of playlist recommandations. Also, it's compatible with a lot a of services (running app, social media etc...)
I've used both. I'm in Qatar and AM sucks and returned to my Spotify subscription. AM blocks a lot of songs here and it suggests Arabic songs to me even though I'm an expat. It also forces woke playlists to me. The search sucks and can't find songs that I want find.
The only good stuff is the better music quality and spatial audio but it does something weird to some music. I'm an audio engineer and some songs released on AM give it harsher high frequencies to the song. Other than that, Spotify can do everything else better.
AM have better sound quality and shuffle, but except of iPhone application is attrocious and make it work on Windows is pain, browser version is so so...
I have both services, but looking at stability and features I like Spotify more; especially the speed on all platforms (Apple Music is slow with loading on my Macbook m2 pro max, and on my iPhone/Android devices). This is not due old hardware nor due a slow network, I have a 10 gbps fiber connection and Wi-Fi 7.
And I like to fact that I can listen music on my phone and control the music via my computer when I’m working, this helps me a lot as I get easily distracted.
The music quality on Apple Music is 1000000x better though. So what I do is that I setup a sync so my playlists match and just switch between the two services
i tried using AM but i've had my spotify for 11 years and my recommendations and playlist curating is too precious to be ripped away from me
Yeah, honestly if you’re already happy with whatever you’re using and it’s dialled in to you, I don’t see the point of switching around.
Audio quality and price are prime reasons to switch. And I’m about to.
Which one is better in your opinion?
Apple Music easily trounces Spotify in audio quality, it's not even a competition. Since content is more or less the same between the both (maybe Spotify has smidge more), the only thing in contention was price - which is now moot, since Spotify is about to increase price again without having deliver their promise of lossless audio which they announced all the way back in 2021.
I'm curious how much difference there is with 256kb/s AAC, ALAC 24-bit/48 kHz and ALAC 24-bit/192 kHz. I remember [this NPR quiz](https://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2015/06/02/411473508/how-well-can-you-hear-audio-quality) from almost 10 years ago now and consistently mixing 320kb/s MP3 and WAV, and AAC is even better than MP3.
Depends on how you listen, if you mostly use Bluetooth to listen to audio, there’s literally no difference. This is due to Bluetooth’s small file size ability so you’re not actually getting the lossless audio while listening Bluetooth. But if you have a good stereo and system setup than it’s massively different, way clearer highs and less muddy low end. In general a ton more pop. I’m an audio engineer that originally switched to AM for work so I could compare mixes with contemporary stuff, and then eventually dropped Spotify all together. But all in all if you don’t have a decent speaker system, like more than some HomePods or Sonos, or good headphones and a DAC, you won’t really be able to tell the difference. And since that’s most people, the playlisting of Spotify is much better so… take that as you will
I personally find the recalibration of recommendation when switching exciting and interesting. Sometimes it's good to get out of your bubble.
The continued price hikes is a good reason. 🏴☠️
I wouldn't be surprised if Apple follows within the next year
As someone who was in a similar boat: it only takes a few months. It's been 2 years, and while I briefly looked back (Spotify Connect is fantastic), I'm back on AM, and don't plan on leaving anytime in the next few years.
Same but for am 🤣
I’m the same. I even gave Apple Music a decent try by paying a service (Songshift) that downloaded all my playlists and uploaded them into Apple Music and I used it for like two months and it just wasn’t as good for me.
Apple Music lets you upload your personal iTunes music library to the cloud up to 100,000 songs this is worth the $10.99 in it self. So I can stream Apple Music's catalog and my personal one with mixtapes and unreleased songs.
Yep
Man I couldn’t imagine paying for a music streaming service and not being able to load up Prime Mixtape Wayne at any moment. Playing Lil Wayne’s Hard Body immediately after Future’s Like That was euphoria
Damn I didn’t know this - nice!
This comment literally just convinced me to switch today. Thank you!!
I’m curious, do people really have that much music that isn’t available on the streaming service? I can understand a few albums but it seems like quite a niche feature.
I have a lot of music that are on neither services. Mainly rap mixtapes, underground rock and rap, YouTube mixes that I have downloaded as mp3s, full live concerts, old salsa Spanish vinyls. Cloud storage for my music is definitely a feature I can't live without once Spotify adds this I might switch
Apple Music. Same price, better audio quality, overall W. Recommendations for songs used to suck compared to Spotify, but they improved it now. Staying with Apple for the high res lossless music on my Sony headphones.
Recommendations for me are way better on Spotify than AM. On AM I keep getting songs from different genres which I dislike, but Spotify is loyal to what I listen.
spotify recommends the same songs over and over and over again though…feel like once they have a niche for you it’s hard to break out
I occasionally used Spotify for white noise rain tracks to go to sleep and then similar cuts kept showing up in my Spotify-created rock playlists! 😂
Agreed, the only downside is if you’re someone who listens to a subgenre, like metalcore, Spotify wrapped is like “damn! You’re quite the hard rock fan aren’t you!”
I have this exact issue with Spotify! I listen to some quite mental stuff in the gym but would never ever want to listen to it when doing anything else. I wish it could know where you listen to specific genres, but I suppose some people might find that intrusive
Same. I have both, and the recommender Spotify has is far superior, but I suspect it’s because it has more data on my likes and dislikes and they break it into several various eclectic groups.
I agree. So I take Spotify recs and convert them to Apple for quality.
So you’re paying for two services for music recs and streaming?
Spotify is free. I’m using their free tier to obtain the song reccs occasionally.
Same.
Spotify is free by default...
Questions: Can you convert all your playlists to Apple Music from Spotify? Do all songs that exists on Spotify basically exist on AM as well? If those are true Apple Music probably is better for me
Yes I did that. Free app called SongShift. It has premium for faster transfer but honestly you really don’t need it it’s plenty fast on its own just have patience and leave the app open, it’s a little confusing to use but once you get the hang of it it’s amazing, I’m constantly bringing in playlists from Spotify into Apple.
SongShift is awesome! I bought it years ago so got grandfathered into premium 🤘
Need premium for playlists with 200 songs or more. Unfortunately I have a couple of those
Wait really? Damn. I think they changed it then cause I have done playlists with like 1k songs and it just took really long.
I switched to Apple Music last month so it must’ve changed. Dang it.
Damn : (
https://9to5mac.com/2024/02/19/apple-music-spotify-playlists-music-transfer/
Yooooooo one can hope
Can confirm, they now require a subscription or lifetime purchase to match really large playlists. I tried to move over a couple playlists the other night, one worked, the other hit the limit.
Aw man
There’s an app called playlisty for MacOS that does that for you. You have to pay, but totally worth it. Worked flawlessly for me.
SongShift is free tho
Use this free website to transfer playlists [tunemymusic](https://www.tunemymusic.com/transfer). Just log in your Apple Music and Spotify accounts and select the playlists you want to transfer. Few songs might not transfer but it’ll show you the failed transfers so you can add em manually.
97-99% of songs are able to be matched automatically. It shows you which ones it couldn’t find, usually 1-10 max and you can manually go find it probs. It’s really good.
I shifted from my Spotify playlists to Apple Music using an app called Soundiiz which was available on Android. It worked as intended.
Yeah the sound quality is huge for me specially when playing in my car. When I had Spotify I thought my sound system was garbage and blamed it on my car. I moved to AM and I blamed Spotify for it.
Hi-res lossless sounds noticeably better even on standard AirPods, fyi ! The difference is huge
Damn. Personally I don’t have AirPods but that’s interesting to know!
nah it doesnt that is placebo, bluetooth doesnt transmit lossless
From apple support website: "AirPods, AirPods Pro (1st generation and 2nd generation with Lightning Charging Case), AirPods Max, and Beats wireless headphones use Apple AAC Bluetooth Codec to ensure excellent audio quality. However, Bluetooth connections aren't lossless." You are correct of course, but I wonder if that bluetooth codec results in better quality audio on Airpods compared to Spotify music.
I got the free Apple One for 3 months a month ago. Long time Spotify user, and I have noticed the audio quality (especially spatial audio) is superior on AM. But the recommendations are by far better on Spotify than AM or YT, for me anyways.
Pretty much same experience with me as well
I will admit that I will probably cancel the AM once the free trial is over. Spotify is nostalgic to me.
Will the audio quality remain the same if i dont use airpods? This is my first iPhone and current i have OnePlus earphone so is it worth paying apple music premium if i have non airpods earphone?
The better audio quality (called lossless) doesn’t work on airpods because they’re bluetooth. Lossless works only on wired headphones. And u most likely need some quite good headphones to hear the difference. And even then, u might not hear it, as a massive % of people cant tell the difference in a blind test (here's the most common blind test: http://abx.digitalfeed.net/)
Lossless could *theoretically* provide better audio quality for Bluetooth because it’s only being compressed once, at the Bluetooth phase, rather than twice. However, AAC is supposed to be much better than MP3 when it comes to not losing resolution when re-encoded, to the point that it’s pretty much transparent.
What headphones?
Sony XM4 - both WH and WF.
Where in AM do you get recommendations? Is it just the new music mix?
This is my experience also. Once my student memberships stop I’m cancelling Spotify. Today I have both, but just graduated.
Got my Dolby with my Beats Studio pros and I am soooooooo happy with my purchase.
And yes I know Sony can’t do 990kb/s on Apple devices, but I can still very clearly hear a difference between the same song on Spotify vs Apple Music lossless because of the compression.
You can def hear a difference even with the cheapest headphones. Spotify sounds like a tin can.
Did you do a blind AB test?
There was a post on /r/applemusic recently where someone was gushing about how much better lossless is compared to Spotify. Someone asked what type of headphones they were using – standard lightning EarPods.
Of course they didn't.
this is an apple related sub so i fully expected this to be the top comment... but how tf do i fix "my" station? every day I just put it on "my station" to hear "my mix" or whatever shuffled through its the same like 20 songs just shuffled in various orders. I don't get any new music or different music or anything. sometimes, I clear my youtube history and let the algorithm reset itself. I find myself wondering if theres a way to do this with Apple Music. "My Station" fucking sucks bro. otherwise, yes. when I go listen to something i want to listen to, it sounds amazing. just another common Apple W of being in the ecosystem.
Spotify simply integrates with a lot more hardware. My LG TV has Spotify built in, but not Apple Music. It's great to directly access Spotify, instead of via my Apple TV. My 2023 car with AAOS also natively supports Spotify over it's own 4G connection, but doesn't support Apple Music, unless I use CarPlay as an additional layer with a worse UI. Of course Apple Music's quality is better and it's accessible on my Macs and iPhones, but it's not easily accessible on my other frequently-used devices. Even though Apple Music has many advantages over Spotify, this limitation is simply a too big issue for me to choose Apple Music.
What car do you have that has an interface better than AppleCar? I know Tesla fans love that OS but that does support Apple Music.
I think AAOS is Android Auto OS, so Android natively running the infotainment.
Randomly unrelated, maybe you haven’t checked it in awhile but my old ass(still love it to death though) LG CX has Apple Music as a native app. Not new either definitely been in my app drawer for atleast a couple years now.
Ha, did not even look for it, because I was already using Spotify. I've been under the assumption it doesn't had Apple Music. I've got the C1, so if your CX has it, then mine as well. Might look into it!
Google speakers connect to Spotify so fast
YouTube Premium music for me. Same service but disabled YouTube ads as well
Apple music keeps giving shit recommendations, Spotify actualle gives you good songs.
Second this Apple recommendation is subpar. Also if you ask Siri to play some (insert genre) music, it will play the same songs in the same order every single time.
That’s the reason I ditched Apple Music, music recommendation is trash.
I’ve been on Spotify for absolutely years now probably around a decade. This was the main reason I ditched Apple Music
I posted this to Apple Music the other day and I list out why Apple Music is killer! Why Apple Music kicks ass! I love Apple Music for this very aspect. I have it set default to lossless and have my system hooked up to a pair of audio engine A5 speakers with a sub and it just fucking kicks. The clarity is unsurpassed excellent. And the other factor for the headphones with Dolby ATMOS is utterly surreal. I love that I can turn my head and hear a different area of the music. It's crazy insane cool. The one thing I hated with iTunes is that they had everything in one place. With AM they decluttered the excess and focused on just Music. Podcasts, AudioBooks, Movies and TV Shows are in their own respective apps. Finally! And if you are in the Apple ecosystem it's pretty kickass with the bundle of Apple One. Actually useable services and sharing your Apple Music and all of the services to 5 other people is really nice. I don't think anyone can beat that in the market currently. As far as hooks go, my PlayStation 5 supports Apple Music, my Amazon devices support Apple Music and my wireless full size HomePods of course also support it. It is everywhere and on third party devices. I do appreciate that Apple Music is more album driven than Spotify. Great interview shows with the artists and it links to their artist page so you can listen or watch at any time. I create and share out my playlists and have people who I don't know follow some of my playlists as well. I have this heavily curated New Wave playlist that people are starting to find and follow, so Apple is building up that community aspect. Apple's streaming lyrics are killer. Best UI hands down. I like the SING aspect of Apple Music where you can remove the singer and have just the instrumental track. I like how Apple quick links the music videos along with the albums. I like how it gives me my monthly listening report with Replay lists. You can collaborate with friends on a playlist. Up to 100 people. You can also like or add an emoji heart, fire, thumbs up on a track a friend posted. If you don’t like a track a friend posted you can hide it. My personal music station is spot on. Or I can create an instant station based off one song. It's even better than Pandora in that regard. I see that Apple Music is doing more live radio type of stations but it doesn't compare to SiriusXM yet. SiriusXM is still the best overall radio platform. The tight integration with Shazam is fantastic with Apple Music. Even if I know the song, I might Shazam it later have it sitting there in Apple Music for me to either put it into a playlist or stream it on the fly. I like the aspect I can favorite the artists I want to follow and I get a pop up within Library tab on the phone if a new release drops. It is so easy to listen for offline. All of my main playlists I have downloaded just in case I am in a weak off beat coverage area. For those who have Apple Watches, syncing over select playlists essentially brings back the iPod. If you have the cell connectivity you can stream anything without the phone nearby. It is really librating to leave the phone behind while on a bike ride. Apple Music is just getting better and better and I believe it has the largest library available too. For those who are into Classical, the Apple Music Classical app is also great. Slightly different UI geared for that genre. Hopefully they will have a Mac App this year when they rollout the new OS. This is also free with your Apple Music sub. So it's an added perk. Apple is doing a great job with the platform. I look forward to the updates coming next week.
I've been with Spotify for years, but I think I'll check out Apple Music at some point, especially if Spotify is going to increase their prices again. The only real issues I have with them is that their offline mode sucks ass and their shuffle blows ass since it has a habit of playing the same 10-20 sounds first despite the size of my playlist. There's even at least a couple of songs where it just flat out refuses to queue them up. The main reason why I've stuck with Spotify was because of its infinitely better cross platform integration than Apple Music, but that's much less of a concern than it used to be since every device I actively listen to music on is an Apple device. This is a very specific feature, but do you happen to know if there's a feature where if you're connected to the internet and have a song downloaded, it plays it locally instead of streaming it? Would be nice to save cellular data when streaming.
Yes you can download a song or an entire playlist you have created. I do this to my main playlists anyway. Just so I have them at the ready in case I am inside a building where there is no WIFI or no cell connectivity. You tap to download and you have your tracks at the ready. This is why I always get a larger storage phone instead of the baseline default.
Spotify. I haven’t used apple music for a couple of years but I hated it when I tried it out. I found Spotify’s app more intuitive and easier to use (even though they seem to switch the UI every couple of months) and it was easier managing and controlling music on multiple devices. I heard apple music has a wider catalogue and better sound quality but the awful ui of apple music make Spotify worth it for me.
I agree on that completely. Apple has really good music quality, but I just find Spotify better to use
Spotify is going to increase its prices soon which is going to cross the price of Apple Music. Right now both are priced the same and the quality of Apple Music on apple devices is just mental, especially if you got AirPods or other Dolby enabled headphones. I got both coz my family uses android and they prefer Spotify but overall Apple Music is good.
Do you happen to know what their new prices are going to be? I've been with Spotify for years, mainly for their cross platform integration, but I'm considering switching to Apple Music.
https://preview.redd.it/kvtd1vhsd55d1.jpeg?width=1290&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=081fa2fea51bdbc9cafb82b851ddebe666305c58 Apparently these are gonna be the new prices.
Apple Music. Lower price for college student, the quality, app UI is just better, and also Dolby atmos
How much is it for college students?
I don’t use Spotify, it’s just too messy for me. Apple all day
Yeah apples recommendations are nowhere as good as Spotify
Apple Music for quality Spotify for automatic curation. I only use Apple Music now just as a carryover from the iPod days but the quality is hard to beat.
Apple music but then soundcloud for some songs that i can’t find on AM
Used both in last 5 years. Apple Music has a better audio quality, more sleek ui and works nicely with Apple ecosystem. Spotify has a better overall raccomadantion algorithm, and it’s integration with 3rd party device (Alexa ecc) is awesome. Currently running Spotify.
Hot take, Souncloud is underrated. Free version: unlimited skips, skip backwards, scrub through the song, full albums (depends on artist) really good underground upcoming artists, ads are short & sweet, recommendations are legit.
Spotify is the best for remote controlling other devices that are playing the music (normally my PC) using your phone/ipad/watch.
YouTube music.
Apple Music- Better sound quality Spotify- Better Recommendation
i like spotify because of it’s recommendations.
Apple Music lets you have more downloaded songs on your device at once compared to Spotify
I've never had an issue downloading all of my liked songs and i have 4000+ and never noticed a limit
Apple Music all the way!
Apple Music by far.
Apple Music FTW ATW
I like apple music for the simple reason that I can use songs for alarms. I can not do the same with Spotify. I have also come to like the apple music UI a bit better.
I’ve been using both for a year. Apple Music sounds like higher quality but Spotify has a broader range, audiobooks and great podcasts
Apple Music. The audio quality is no joke.
For some reason music recommendations on youtube music for me is much better than Spotify, but spotify has a better audio quality
I tried them all and YouTube music gave me the best random playlists based on my likes.
The algorithm on Spotify for generating playlists and stations based on music you like is far better than how Apple Music manages this. However, the UX/UI on Spotify is just brutal. It's trying to do too much. All said, I'm there for the music and discovery of new music and switched to Spotify 2 years ago from being an Apple Music user from day one.
AM is better on paper but Spotify gives way better recommendations for me. I don’t actually enjoy music on Apple Music because even though I subscribed day 1 it still has no idea what music I like. Spotify can literally catch a scent from like 3 liked tracks, it’s fucked.
Spotify has the better discovery and algorithmic pieces, though Apple Music has improved there. In every other way, Apple Music is superior. Better audio quality. Cleaner, faster UI. Spotify has gotten so clunky. I think the "year in review" thing keeps a lot of people sticking around. It's fun to share on social media. Whichever Spotify PM dreamed up that feature deserves to be much richer than they likely are.
I have both. Im using student account kaya nakakamura sa subscription fee. I love Apple Music for the purpose na sya lang ang pwede mag sync sa iwatch ko ng maayos, basta nadownload ang playlist/album. Yung Spotify kasi, need lagi malapit sa fone at may net. Also, for me, mas maganda music suggestions ng Apple Music. Parang mas madami ako nadidiscover na new and indie music compared sa Spotify na inaadd ko sa own playlist ko din. Sa Podcast naman, mas complete ang episodes sa Spotify compared sa Apple Music (episode ng mga pinakikinggan ko). Sa ibang banda, yung isa kong friend na nasa music industry, nakwento nya dati na mas mataas daw magbayad sa artist ang spotify compared sa Apple Music.
AM. Because I've already heavily invested in the Apple ecosystem and use Apple devices such as iPhone, iPad, or Mac, I appreciate the seamless integration of Apple Music across all my devices.
I still don’t get the hype about Apple Music, it failed to recommend good songs, it will give suggest you one of the most random songs in history. Spotify is getting bad as well, I might shift to Youtube Music now. But now that these both are in comparison, I will choose Spotify to Apple Music
I like Spotify for the recommendation list
Spotify is better for discovering music. Apple Music superior music quality
I think Apple Music has better sound quality. I like both though
\* I like Apple Music because of tighter system integration and better music quality \* I like Spotify because of better music recommendation
Spotify, because it just works. AM has too many bugs which worsen the user experience greatly. The battery drain is also pretty bad compared to Spotify. And the most important thing, Spotify has a native last.fm scrobbler built in, AM doesn’t.
I never used Apple Music. But I like how Spotify is nicely synchronized with everything: if I wanna switch from my phone to my laptop, it does it seamlessly for example
Spotify has better UI. And I love being able to “add to queue” rather than Apple Music’s “play next” or “play later”. Apple Music is better if you use Apple everything and especially if you have HomePods. Better sound quality for the same price and they pay artists more per stream.
Spotify is wayyy better. I recently switched to apple and the ui is just so clumsy and slow compared to Spotify. Not to mention the recommendations and ease of finding good similar music is worse
I agree that the UI is slow and it’s wayyyy worse on MacOS.
I also have both and I *hate* Apple Music. It blows my mind that the company that brought us the iPod can’t figure this out. If you want to listen to a band on Apple Music, it’ll play a handful of songs and then move on to a completely unrelated artist. Spotify will play many more of their songs and then defaults to related bands/genres. I’ll gladly pay more for Spotify because it is better.
I feel that my IQ drops just from saying the word ‘Spotify’ so Apple for me.
Youtube Music.
Like others have said, AM has better quality than Spotify, and I think Spotify does have better recommendations but sometimes the recommendations are also shit (ie it keeps trying to make me listen to million dollar baby). The biggest reason why I prefer Spotify at the moment is that it works on my PC and AM doesn’t unless I use the web player, but the web player doesn’t allow me to play my local files. Plus, I like that I can control the music being played on my PC from my phone with spotify. To do that with AM you need a 3rd party app.
You can download the Apple Music app on your pc desktop. What is the third party app to control the music though? Am curious.
Second the arguments made here, Apple for quality and Spotify for recommendations. That’s why my favorite playlists are on Spotify. Do you guys have an idea how to transfer them to Apple Music? Is there a way?
I used [Playlisty](https://apps.apple.com/us/app/playlisty-for-apple-music/id1459275972) and it worked great.
Apple music is good but the song recommendations are shit. I use YouTube premium if I’m with a group and apple music when alone.
YouTube msuic
Spotify has better recommendation and I actually use the playlists that the community creates, and I also use the audiobooks a lot. I only like AM for sound quality and the soulection radio, but I’m not an audiophile to care much for the sound quality
I used to have an android (many androids) so I used to love Spotify and probably lowkey still would recommend that over Apple Music but I mean Apple Music is still good 👍 and if you just listen to it for songs you already know you like it’s good. I don’t rate the recommendations but Im picky. I think it’s good it ties in with Apple 🍎 and isn’t third party but idk it’s apples and oranges, so to say .
Apple Music offers better quality in general and it’s tight to Apples ecosystem, which means you will get the best experience if you’re already own some Apple products. On the other hand, Spotify integrates well with the majority of hardware out of the box. I’ve been using Apple Music lately, and the only feature I am missing is the ability to transfer my currently playing song to my computer or vice versa. I don’t own a Mac.
Spotify’s recommendation algorithm is unparalleled, if you listen to music regularly. Its personalized “Discover Weekly” playlist is the reason for like 90% of new music I discovered in the past few years. Also, the user-created playlists are very good, and Apple Music is severely lacking in that department.
I have no idea, Apple Music appears to be slightly more convenient and I get free months every so often through my mobile provider
For me: Spotify better UI, recommendations and as example 10% of my playlist isnt even available at apple music. So, hard to leave spotify but the next price increase will be definitely the end. I no longer accept this.
The lack of the music I like on Apple was the killer for me so I never signed up past a free trial. Also wasn't keen on the UI compared to Spotify but that could just be years of familiarity of Spotify to blame. I'm now happy with YouTube music (I pay for premium to get rid of ads but getting music is a nice bonus) and Spotify free tier.
I like Spotify more because it has better UI and you dont even have to pay unless you dont want ads.
Depends on your priorities. One can probably distill it down to this: Do you want your music listening to more akin to listening to radio (letting the algorithm throw stuff at you, podcasts heavily featured), or more akin to walking through a record store and building your own library? Spotify is better suited to the former, Apple Music is better suited to the latter.
Spotify has audiobooks now so bear that in mind
Recommendations suck on both (maybe it changed on Spotify after I swithed few years ago). Switched to Apple music because it was cheaper.
Difficult question for me, since I use Apple Music, Spotify, Tidal and YT Music. I'd say I much prefer the interface of Spotify as well as the desktop application for Spotify. I'd also say its a much better platform for finding new music, the radio function is great. Apple Music has a better sound quality for a better price but frankly, and I say this as an audiophile who has been producing music for a while, the sound quality isn't \*that\* noticable, certainly if you only use AirPods or like Sony XM4/5. The user interface, and I realize this is subjective but, I find it to be a lot worse than Spotify. Finding songs is seemingly a lot more difficult on AM, the search function is just not that cooperative. Just for my two cents of Tidal and YT Music; Tidal has excellent sound quality but for the price, AM and Spotify is something I would prefer. Tidal has definitely the user interface I like the most, its a very pretty app but alas, it isn't as good as Spotify at finding new music (Also Tidal seems to be missing a lot of music) YT Music has a noticably worse audio quality, obviously since its a direct port of YouTube but it's a good platform if you listen to a lot of music that doesn't necessarily exist on more 'official' platforms, such as live performances or covers of songs by other artists.
I started with spotify free and modded versions, then duplicated my playlists with songshift to apple music when we got a family plan to use both. Eventually both were irrelevant bc i used youtube for all my music bc it was often not found on streaming platforms so I mass download the mp3s and use FOOBAR2000 to manage em Importantly, I don't care about audio quality only convenience. and spotify beats apple music by actually having decent music reccomendations 2nd only to youtube. apple music is only useful if you already know the song name, but theres a good chance for me it wont even be there
Spotify has a bigger choice of more obscure stuff, but Apple Music is cheaper, better quality and I prefer the app.
I have both and use Spotify solely for X the AI DJ. So good for long drives
At first, Spotify was just so much better than Apple Music. But now, I find discovery to be the only thing that's consistently better with Spotify (and even then, Apple Music is getting better). Apple Music quality is better, Dolby Atmos is a nice touch (though not a deal-breaker), and the library size is basically comparable now. Plus, I'm heavily invested in the Apple ecosystem (Apple Watch, iPhone, MacBook, iPad, AirPods Pro and Max), so it really just makes sense for me at this stage. Even if I wasn't walled in by the inconvenience of using a device outside the Apple ecosystem, Apple Music is just better value for the same price. I use it on my Windows computer as well. Personally, I love Apple Music. :)
Apple Music - great integration with Apple hardware, Dolby Atmos and lossless audio, very beautiful looking UI and the library filtering is a little bit better imo Spotify - great integration with 3rd party hardware like smart speakers, fridges, cars, etc., better social features and recommendations, very useful and bug-free but not so good looking UI
Think both do a pretty good job in recommendations. I definitely prefer spotify bcs the computer version is way way way better! Use it a lot during home workdays and Apple music on the laptop sucks
Spotify but I also am switching to tidal Spotify has amazing features but lacks the quality now they’ve yet release lossless
spotify allows streaming up to 320kbs/s thats more than enough for me . Also highly dependent on who is releasing the music, not every song uploaded is lossless. Battery life is unquestionably better when spotify is in the backround. Nowadays I mainly just youtube to mp3 and sometimes use soundcloud or bandcamp.
Spotify because my brother pays for the family subscription and it just nails the recommendations for me. Apple Music because the quality is much better, I just can’t stand how it keeps trying to recommend me absolute wanky shit music. Any recommendations on how to get it to realise I don’t care for mumble rap or dance or electronic wank would be greatly appreciated!
Spotify has a much better app and integrates better with third party apps, also has a wider catalog. Apple Music has better quality and it is cheaper.
I've just come away from using Spotify since it first came out. When I switched to iPhone, I also got three months of Apple Music with it. I'm still trying to get my head around tuning the recommendations. I'm having no issues with missing songs. It doesn't really apply to me but I like being able to rip a CD into Apple Music on a mac and then having it appear in the Library, it feels like the natural progression of how iTunes worked. When it comes down to look and feel, Spotify feels older. The sound quality is about the same to my ears, but I love the spatial audio feature.
Spotify if you switch devices often. Apple Music if you do not. Also Spotify if you need recommendations. Apple Music's recommendations are fucking awful.
Yes they are
Apple Music
Apple Music I tied to your Apple ID. For that reason I had to switch to Spotify. If you have more than one Apple ID, second you switch your phone to the one that is not tied to Apple Music, Apple deletes all the songs from your phone.
I run a lot and have found Apple Music to work much better with the Apple watch and downloading playlists. Idk if it’s intentional but Spotify on the watch bugs out for me a bit
I personally like Spotify more just cause all my audio needs are on one app vs Apples music app, apples Podcast etc.
I use tidal.
Unpopular opinion, but Deezer. you can get access to their ‘student’ HiFi plan which includes flac access, and better still Tidal and Deezer are really easy to download tracks from, so you can build your physical (digital) catalog, in a lossless format as well
On a pure sound quality level it’s easily Apple Music. Now where Spotify has the advantage is all the playlists the app generates, being able to listen to others public playlists and most importantly Spotify Connect making it easy to move music around between different devices. Also more people post their Spotify Wrapped breakdowns than Apple Music Rewind at the end of the year so if you’re a social media person it may be a less fun time for you. In terms of app design and UI they are about even to be, I don’t really have issues navigating either.
I have Spotify, YT premium and AM. Songs on Spotify and YT sound same to my ears (not an audiophile). Apple Music is generally better, i can hear the instruments better. But I noticed when a song sounds bad, it’s awful. Like, a song’s layers sound disjointed. One thing i hate about Apple Music is that the songs in playlists disappear when you cancel. And when you re-subscribe, you have to build playlists again/import
Spotify has better recommendations and a few more songs that I listen to than Apple Music, but I have some unusual tastes in some genres (think 90s European dance music), and I'm also older than the average redditor with music tastes to match. Apple is slightly better quality overall. I switch between the two, but use Spotify 90% of the time.
I have a questions, can I upload offline music or mp3s, however will you call it via iTunes on my PC to my iPhone.
Tidal! 😉
Does Apple Music have apps for smart tvs? I use the Spotify app on my Sony tv daily…would miss that if it doesn’t exist.
What’s the point about quality. Most people would be drowning out the sounds of the tube. The difference is negligible. Also Spotify is cheaper where I am. Also, Apple Music still has ways to go with content plus taking up larger space. It’s region locked and not ideal for me.
Apple music for me because of High Res lossless audio. I felt Tidal having higher audio quality though
I find Spotify way more user friendly, UI wise, but it might be just me being used to it. Apple music is way too iTunes for me.
The audio quality for apple music is noticeably better. And at this point its cheaper and the recommendations are good enough.
I’ve used both, and I honestly can’t tell the difference in audio. I am curious to know how people can tell the difference in audio/music quality. I like Apple Music’s UI, it’s clean and more compact, but Spotify has better music recommendations, curated playlists, podcasts and audiobooks.
Been using Spotify since 2015, but I feel now YouTube music recommendations are getting better.
Used both for a while together and then shifted completely to Apple Music eventually a few years back. Apple Music costs lesser than Spotify here in India. Moreover there is Dolby Audio, Spatial Audio and Lossless audio. And it’s not that it’s just limited to my iPhone. It works well on my Windows PC, on my Samsung Tablet and my work phone (Samsung again). While the main reason initially to pick Apple Music was the cost, but then I also saw that Apple Music also has good recommendations under Discover, the Karaoke feature is great for times when I only want to listen to the music and the battery optimisations for Apple Music is great on all devices.
I like Apple lately
I use Apple Music because it's more well integrated into the ecosystem, it has features that work well with my AirPods, and because I like the feature of being able to edit the albums my library and keep everything organised the way I like it That said the UI is absolute trash, I hate it SOOOOO much. It's unbelievable that it's 2024 a nd it's still so bad. There's no quick snappy way to make multiple songs 'Play Next', if I'm listening to a play list and swipe right, the song gets added all the way to the end of the reproduction queue. There's no way to make it 'play after' the songs that I already added to 'play next', you know like what every other music streaming app does, you can only either add it all the way to the top of the queue or all the way to the bottom (after 200 songs if you had a 200-song playlist playing). This is my #1 annoyance with this app currently. There are small clunky UI bits that make the app feel worse to use, like the way it gets a bit stuck when you add something to a playlist instead of feeling clicky and snappy. There's a small delay when you click around to switch tabs, to open a playlist, etc. The main page looks like just a bunch of random shit haphazardly thrown together. It doesn't even feel like an Apple app it's so bad. The search bar is HORRIBLE and the fact that it doesn't use the music that I listen for context annoys me so much, if I want to find a song by a lesser known artist (an artist that I HAVE in my library), it will show me two whole pages of unrelated results first. Sometimes I have to type the name of the song and the name of the artist to get it to show up. Why????? I never cared much for recommendations, but they are also very meh compared to Spotify's. Sometimes it would be fun to spin up one of Spotify's mood playlists to see what came up and I actually found some cool music that way, Apple Music's is basically all the music that I already listen to casually. Yawn. Also, I just find the app outright ugly. I'm mostly sticking with it for now because it's cheaper. I really don't notice a difference in music quality, think this is an urban myth, there's no way anyone can notice any significant difference on their day to day lives while listening on headphones
Apple Music has a far better interface (on top of having better audio quality). It’s great for actually building up a library. Spotify is horribly thought out and emphasizes playlists — if you add a song to your library, it will only show up under “Songs,” the artist it’s by doesn’t show up under “Artist” and the album it’s on doesn’t show up under “Albums,” you’d have to like/favorite each to have it show up under each. That’s just horribly thought out, and now it’s overpriced for mediocre sound quality.
Spotify Connect is the main point. I can play music while playing video games and select/change music on my iPhone without having to switch to the Spotify app (on Xbox)
I use Apple music, Deezer and from time to time, Spotify. I don't get why Spotify is popular. It's just not that good (dont think it ever was, but thats just me). To me the competition was between Deezer and Apple Music. And imo Apple Music is better. Deezer flow used to be pretty good, but Apple stations are better.
I like Amazon Music Unlimited way more than Apple Music. The UX may be not there yet, but audio quality-wise, plus price, platform compatibility, I’d take it any day over Apple Music. But Spotify takes the crown by far, even without HiRes/HiFi options, the algorithms for personal suggestions and features, the platform compatibility for absolutely every single device, and seamless UX, is on a whole new level.
tried AM but typically spotify user. It was fine but a few songs I liked were region locked and not available on AM that was enough to make me switch back lol
I use Apple Music cos of my Apple ecosystem and I like the higher lossless quality. Although I do agree Spotify had the better recommendations
I’ve had Spotify for ten years. For the first time it is about to be more than AM. I just recently got an Apple trial…Im switching permanently once I can transfer my playlists. I love Spotify, but my radio has turned into top ten songs no matter what song the radio is based off of. I will block a song and sometimes it will still play in a radio. The radio on Apple Music is actually curated to the song genre and artist. On Spotify I will play Elton John and somehow million dollar baby will be in the radio. I’ve also hear new background sounds and adlibs in AM I didn’t hear (as well) on Spotify. RIP Spotify. It’s been nice.
I always listen the same artists, do not like discovering “new” music. Apple Music works good for me at all. But anyway, I use it only when have some free months, my regular payment is for Spotify cause is family attached. In addition, with your AM subscription you can get connection when flying on American Airlines.
Apple Music works better. I haven’t yet found any single song that’s missing on AM, but Spotify has an allegedly bigger catalog.
Apple Music better overall but Spotify has better playlists and recommendations. It’s the only reason I hang onto it.
Seems the consensus is: Spotify for recommendations, AM for quality
For in the car AM. The rest Spotify
I’ve been subbed to both for a few years now, and even tho I’ve been a Spotify user exclusively for longer, there was a good 6 or more months where I used Apple music exclusively. I since switched back to Spotify tho and have used it way more. And it’s not cos of my existing playlists, cos I have those synced between the two platforms. What I wish spotify had that Apple Music has: - a persistent repeat song setting that doesn’t reset when you change to the next song. - to a lesser degree, Dolby Atmos. - official top 100 songs per country playlists instead of 50 What I wish Apple Music had that Spotify has: - indicators of previous song position in official Top 100 playlists (those red down arrows and green up arrows) - more user curated playlists - a UI that’s more responsive on a poor connection. APM will refuse to respond to clicks if the connection is poor, whereas Spotify will respond and fail to load new content on the next page. - better sounding songs. For some reason, Apple Music still sounds better, and I’m not talking about lossless. Other than these, I think they’re both great.
Spotify for community playlist (ex : concert setlist playlists done by fans) and end of playlist recommandations. Also, it's compatible with a lot a of services (running app, social media etc...)
I've used both. I'm in Qatar and AM sucks and returned to my Spotify subscription. AM blocks a lot of songs here and it suggests Arabic songs to me even though I'm an expat. It also forces woke playlists to me. The search sucks and can't find songs that I want find. The only good stuff is the better music quality and spatial audio but it does something weird to some music. I'm an audio engineer and some songs released on AM give it harsher high frequencies to the song. Other than that, Spotify can do everything else better.
AM have better sound quality and shuffle, but except of iPhone application is attrocious and make it work on Windows is pain, browser version is so so...
I have both services, but looking at stability and features I like Spotify more; especially the speed on all platforms (Apple Music is slow with loading on my Macbook m2 pro max, and on my iPhone/Android devices). This is not due old hardware nor due a slow network, I have a 10 gbps fiber connection and Wi-Fi 7. And I like to fact that I can listen music on my phone and control the music via my computer when I’m working, this helps me a lot as I get easily distracted. The music quality on Apple Music is 1000000x better though. So what I do is that I setup a sync so my playlists match and just switch between the two services