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Spotify or Apple Music? This is a question. These two platforms shares common features but they have their own features. To know which one is better for you, you can read this article.
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Spotify and Apple Music are two widely used streaming music services. While both platforms offer music streaming capabilities, they each have their own unique advantages and disadvantages. When choosing between the two services, you need to compare the two platforms from various aspects. So, the question remains, Spotify vs Apple Music, which is the better choice for you?
Luckily, to help you make the best option, this article makes a thoroughly comparison of these two services. If that’s what you need, please stay with us and keep reading.
Platform | Spotify | Apple Music |
---|---|---|
Ease of Use |
|
|
Price | $11 a month($6 for students) | $11 a month ($6 for students) |
Family Plan | Up to 6 people ($17) | up to 6 people ($17) |
Free tier | Yes but ad-supported | No, only Beats 1 radio |
Free trial | 3 month | 1 month |
Audio quality |
Web player: 256 kbps AAC (Premium) 128 kbps AAC (Free) Desktop/Mobile/Tablet: 320 kbps (Premium) 160 kbps (Free) |
Lossless audio Dolby Atoms 256 kbps AAC |
Music library | over 100 million songs, 2.6 million podcasts | over 100 million songs |
Both Apple Music and Spotify boast immense music libraries, each offering over 70 million songs from just about any artist you can imagine along with thousands of expertly curated playlists.
However, Apple Music tends to win exclusive debuts of albums from the world's biggest superstars like Taylor Swift, Frank Ocean, Drake, and more.
But hardcore music fans may still prefer Spotify's unmatched depth in niche genres like folk, electronica, jazz, classical, and more.
Ultimately both services have vast catalogs for their core demographics — Apple Music catering best to mainstream pop listeners and Spotify dominating overall variety.
Apple Music delivers great audio quality with 256 kbps AAC files across all devices. Spotify also streams at a decent "Standard" quality of 96 kbps Ogg Vorbis out-of-box.
But audio-oriented users can crank Spotify streams up much higher across Premium tiers: "High" (320 kbps), "Very High" (approximately 6-900 kbps), and at the top end “HiFi” delivering near lossless-quality music at 9216 kbps.
Essentially, while casual listeners will be plenty happy with Apple Music audio, true audiophiles have more refinement options on Spotify Premium for enjoying extremely high fidelity streams.
The most powerful Spotify conversion software with super fast conversion
Spotify and Apple Music both deliver appealing interfaces making browsing endless music straightforward. Apple Music adopts Apple's signature aesthetic with blown-up album art, a tasteful black/grey/white color scheme, and evenly spaced text.
Navigation stays consistent from iOS to desktop too. Spotify features a darker palette punctuated by its trademark lime green accents.
While dense with tabs and menus, controls generally remain understandable. For simplicity alone, Apple Music inches ahead - especially for those less experienced streaming music.
Weekly and Release Radar epitomize why Spotify is undisputed industry leader in algorithmically personalizing music to individual tastes.
Apple Music's hand-curated playlists also impress yet lack the "magic" feeling of Spotify continually understanding your preferences.
Spotify also leverages its community with 4 billion+ user-shared playlists. For tailored playlists down to the song, Spotify still wins.
Given Spotify's independent status, you can find it on an astoundingly wide array of platforms beyond phones and laptops — from smart speakers and wearables to gaming consoles, smart home devices, in-car entertainment systems, and everything between.
Apple Music predictably focuses its integration mainly into Apple's gardens — iOS, Mac, Apple TV, CarPlay, etc. While Apple Music has expanded to Android, Echo speakers, and Windows, Spotify's universal multi-platform support can’t be beaten.
Both Apple Music and Spotify adopt an identical $9.99 USD monthly fee for their unlimited, ad-free individual plans. However Spotify offers greater flexibility for price-sensitive users, with discounted annual plans and segmented offerings like Premium Student ($4.99/month) and Premium Duo ($12.99/month for couples under one roof).
One advantage Apple holds is cheaper access via Voice Plan for Siri requests ($4.99/month). But cost concerned users may prefer Spotify's free, ad-supported base tier with shuffle functionality over Apple Music’s lack of any free option.
For music discovery, Spotify again demonstrates why its become shorthand for streaming excellence — an explore section highlights rising artists getting early buzz while well trained algorithms suggest songs, albums, artists and playlists you may like at the individual user level.
Apple Music catches up some through human curation with daily highlights, artist spotlights and album commentary sourced from editors. But Spotify feels more personalized, intelligent and focused when it comes to uncovering your next favorite artist or song gem.
Can I get Apple Music or Spotify for free?
Spotify has an ad-supported free tier which streams in shuffle mode only. It has limited skips and lacks downloading abilities. Apple Music has no free tier but offers an extending 6-month free trial period for first-time subscribers to sample the Premium experience.
Which service sounds better - Apple Music or Spotify?
Apple Music streams at an agreeable 256kbps bitrate, while Spotify uses multiple higher fidelity settings like 320kbps “High” quality and 1411kbps “HiFi” delivering closer to lossless CD quality streams which sound fantastic on high-end gear.
Can I upload or listen to my own song files?
Apple Music lets you upload up to 100,000 songs to match Apple’s catalog. Spotify currently lacks official support for uploading your personal files to its servers. But Spotify desktop and some mobile apps let you play local files while the Spotify app is open.
Can I listen to music offline?
Yes, both streaming services allow saving songs, albums and playlists to your device’s storage for offline listening without an internet connection. Limits apply based on subscription tier.
If you want to avoid all the restrictions and limitations to download whatever you like from both platforms, you will have to use an external streaming music downloader software.
When choosing between Spotify and Apple Music, the better choice is subjective and depends on your individual preferences and needs. However, it is important to no matter which service you go for, you can transfer your Spotify playlists to Apple Music with some great converters or vice versa.