The best music players + audio engines for android.
 
Hi, guys... Just wanna let you guys know & share a few of my opinions...basically, they are all with advantages & disadvantages, not including preferences for each person. Regardless, just give it a try...
 
Here are for audio engines:
 
1. XtremeBeats Audio Engines
2. AwesomeBeats
3. PureAudio 2.0
+ SONY xCLEAR+xLOUD
 
Additionally you can put these also:
 
*. ACID AwesomeBass (AddsOn)
*. VIPERAudio (if you like)
 
All installed in my smartphones & tablets. Mind you, they are mostly in " .zip " so, root your phone first & install CWM recovery boot...
 
Now, the BEST music player 4 android (my version, at least)...
 
1. jetAudio Plus
2. ONKYO HiFi Player
3. TTPod
4. Radsone DCT
5. Neutron Music Player
6. N7P
7. Soundbest Lite
8. Denon Club
9. JBL
10. Smart Player Pro/Apollo
 
Set your preference & get to know each player...it will be awesome...never really like poweramp, somehow...been with jetaudio/ttpod/onkyo since the beginning...
 
To me, sounds are more important than others such as, options, text, album arts, etc...wouldn't mind if they provide them though...
Oh...get 3 pairs at least... a good quality in-ear such as, monster turbine, akg, denon, sennheiser, brainwavz, audio technica, marshall, etc or if you wanna go cheap but without sound quality compromised, you can look for chinese one like; soundmagic e10s, phrodi M201, etc...these are good for everyday or on the go even at home...
 
Imagine, if you top them up with nice DAC...just one word..."EARGASM" more polite, "HEARVEN"
 
Just give it a try and let me know...ENJOY YOUR MUSIC TO THE FULLEST...live our LIFE as it meant to be HEARD...PROPERLY, that is...
 
CHEERS...

asskicka101 said:

 
Now, the BEST music player 4 android (my version, at least)...
 
1. jetAudio Plus
2. ONKYO HiFi Player. . .
 
Set your preference & get to know each player...it will be awesome...never really like poweramp, somehow...been with jetaudio/ttpod/onkyo since the beginning...
 
Just give it a try and let me know...ENJOY YOUR MUSIC TO THE FULLEST...live our LIFE as it meant to be HEARD...PROPERLY, that is...
 
CHEERS...

Click to expand...

jetAudio has been my favorite player for years. Not that many around head-fi prefer it though. The Android version is curently unable to play from my NAS - although other apps are able to see my NAS as a huge hard drive. I'm probably going to have to hack a little. When trying to open up a network audio file, android doesn't even give me jetAudio as an option, although it does work for local files or storage attached to my USB OTG cable. It could also be my old klunky Seagate Central NAS. Seagate's first implementation had problems as it would show up as a device without a driver in Windows - and Seagate acknowledged the problem and admitted there was no driver for it and users would have to put up with the yellow error message in Control Panel or disable it. Seagate has since discontinued this implementation and came out with a retooled line using the same name and model number (like Dell does with their laptops). At least our hobby manufacturers have the sense not to name 25 different sets of cans the same model number.

Why you haven't tried MyAudioStream a good audio player and streamer. Also downloads music from any server and you can play it offline!

I also produce and mix. JetAudio has BBE on it, which all other media players mentioned in this thread do not. BBE and Aphex are ubiquitous tools these days for that kind of work.

Do you think the best player for Android with the best SQ which is it?

stereolab42 said:

  I just tried a whole bunch of music players and so far, GoneMad is the only one with the ability to handle very large music libraries (I have a 128GB microSD card filled with tracks). All I'm asking for is the same interface as what an iPod Classic gives me -- the ability to drill down from Genre -> Artist -> Album -> Track. Nope, nobody does that but GoneMad.

Click to expand...

ONKYO HF Player does it as well.  I also find this feature useful.

My phone Galaxy S5 used to have native gapless playback on 4.4.2 and 5.1.1, and many music players allowed the functionality with very little to no difference in sound quality, since most use the stock audio engine.  After I updated to 6.0.1 the gapless playback doesn't seem to function anymore.  It was "officially" supported after 4.1, but it seems that every manufacturer does things their own way, even on different versions of android on the same phone.  I spent a couple of hours testing most of the popular players on google play, possibly more than 30.  Most of them use the stock android engine, so none of these support gapless playback, and if they differ in sound quality it probably comes from their sound effects algorithms.  The players in the following list are among those that have their own sound engines and I was able to test.  I mostly looked for three things: a well designed interface, with an easy to use library view, gapless playback, and a 7+ band equalizer.  The equalizer is mostly because my portable headphones Westone UM3X have a rather uneven frequency response curve, and really do need it in order not to sound boomy with a big dip in the upper mids/highs. 
 
PowerAmp - well designed interface, gapless playback, 10 band equalizer
 
GoneMad - a bit cleaner interface compared to PowerAmp, gapless playback, 10 band equalizer
 
Neutron - this is by far the most advanced music player for android.  The amount of customization to the interface and sound settings is overwhelming.  Once set up correctly, however, it does provide the most advanced sound shaping engine.  The equalizer can be configured with 20 different bands, each band customized individually for width, frequency and amplitude.  Gapless playback works correctly, as well as every other setting I try, or at least it seems to, which is astonishing indeed.  Most of the apps on this list are paid, with some exceptions, and if one was to pay for a sound player, I feel like this would be the biggest bang for the buck.
 
PlayerPro - Installed together with its DSP pack it offers gapless playback as well as 10 band equalizer.  The interface is well designed just like PowerAmp and GoneMad, only in a different flavor.  This player seems to be able to function as a video player as well, but I found that it doesn't seem to support as many file types as VLC.
 
Onkyo HF - I tried this player only after reading the post by asskicka101.  What a pleasant discovery indeed.  This player seems to be not very popular yet, but out of the bunch listed here, it is the only free player (without ads too) that is able to compete to the best premium ones, almost feature for feature.  In addition it also allows Digital Output for use with a USB DAC.  The interface is well designed with very simple menus, yet there is no lack in functionality and just like GoneMad it does offer the ability to drill down to Genre>Artist>Album>Track.  The equalizer can be configured with almost unlimited number of bands which can be moved around so they have customized frequency and amplitude.  Only Neutron's equalizer is more powerful.  Gapless playback works perfectly, without even having any settings for it, just like mostly everything else in this player.
Edit: I spent some time with Onkyo HF and I found some things lacking.  I sent an email to the developer in hope that they consider updating.
1. The equalizer allows to save a preset, but I could not find a file location where presets are being saved.  The other players have this functionality, and it is much needed.
2. The media library scanner only automatically adds new files, it does not automatically update the library with deleted songs.  It has to be done manually from the settings.
3. The media library scanner automatically adds all new music files from the phone internal storage, it is not possible set specific folders where to scan on the phone internal storage.  It is possible to limit the scanner to specific folders on the external SD card, but it would still add any sound files from the internal phone storage.
4. On the newer android 5.0+ it does not allow to delete files on the external SD card.
 
DeadBeef - In terms of sounds quality, this app hits the mark.  Gapless playback works and 10 band equalizer is available, but I found this app seriously lacking in terms of interface functionality.  There is no library to speak of, and the way you browse to get to the music files as well as total lack of cover art viewer is a bit too much for me.  The app has just the bare minimum in order to be usable, and while usable it might be, it is quite tedious to do the most basic things that a music player does.  It might be compelling for some people with very old hardware or those that hate any graphics and like to see a black screen with lines of text on it that requires endless tapping and swiping to get things done.  Ads for the free version, and probably worth keeping as they are the only thing that adds some color to the grim and endless black cosmos.
 
JetAudio - I only tested the free version, but the sound engine doesn't seem to allow for gapless playback on my phone.  Well designed interface and 10 band equalizer.  Ads for the free version.
 
N7player - Again no gapless playback, even though this player also appears to use its own sound engine.  I didn't care much about their "user-friendly interface", the default library view is quite annoying to see every time you open the app, much less to try to make use of.  I would say quite a feat for the designers to successfully screw up something that is so simple.  10 band equalizer, and ads for the free version.
 
Stellio - The gapless playback worked, but no matter the buffer setting, I consistently got crackles while playing.  Nicely designed interface with 12 band equalizer.  Ads for the free version.

What player does folder browsing? I'm using Onkyo HF player right now and it doesn't have that... A bit disappointed.

sp12er3 said:

What player does folder browsing? I'm using Onkyo HF player right now and it doesn't have that... A bit disappointed.

Click to expand...

Neutron does it.

Of the players I listed, all of them can do it except Onkyo HF.

Which is sadly the only free, USB DAC capable one?

I've never used USB DAC, but according to this thread http://www.head-fi.org/t/566664/android-neutron-music-player/315#post_11388156 every player can output to a USB DAC as long as your phone supports it natively.

Hrm... Is there any way to enable Android to use external DAC as the main output all the time? So even other activity like watching movies and the like are outputted through the DAC also?

I spent some more time with the players, and I tried a few others, and made a comparison table.  As a short note, this whole testing was inspired by the inability of my phone (Galaxy S5) to play gaplessly after I updated to 6.0.1.  In my opinion if Samsung didn’t screw it up, the whole exercise would be almost obsolete, as there are now plenty of players on Google Play that support gapless playback on Android 4.1+.  Still the players below which use their own sound engine have perhaps higher quality and more customizable equalizers.
 

 
sort library - Notes which players allow different views in the library to be sorted by different criteria (year, track#, artist, etc.)  Some do not have a sorting feature, but sort the items correctly in each view (alphabetically or by track# when in track view).
 
restrict scanner folder - This column shows two things, wheather the particular player has a way to restrict the library to specific folder/folders, and how the scan is initiated.
 
genre>artist>album>track - Many of us find this particular library view hierarchy useful for large music collections.
 
edit queue order - Some players can rearrange the play order of the now playing list, PowerAmp and Neutron need to have the tracks added to a queue list first, which is separate from now playing list.  This queue list is saved and needs to be cleared first every time new tracks are played, or else they'll be added, in order to have this capability.  The normal now playing list in PowerAmp and Neutron does not have a way to change the playing order of tracks.
 
equalizer export - A few players offer a way to export different settings including custom equalizer presets to a file.
 
JetAudio: In my previous post I noted that it doesn't have a gapless playback capability, but after disabling AGC it worked perfectly.  This player is quite unique in that it uses Android's native media scanner, which will automatically update the library every time there is a change to the phone's storage.  A manual scan can be called when needed if trying to add files that are not supported natively by android but supported by the player, like APE files.  The drawback is that the library can't be restricted to a specific folder, but the advantage is that for all normal files there is no additional service that needs to run in order to monitor for file changes.
 
Onkyo HF: The player is free, except if you want to output high-res audio to a USB DAC.  I imagine that otherwise the audio is down-sampled to 16/44.1.  This is a feature that is also only supported in Neutron.  Theoretically the equalizer can have 16,384 bands, but practically you are limited to how many points you can add on the response curve by tapping along it.  Custom presets can't be exported and I could not find a file where it saves them, so it would be practically impossible to recreate if you need to reinstall the player or change a phone.  Despite an option for automatic media scanning, I did not find it to remove files from the library after I removed them from the storage.  It has to be done manually and the media scanner can be restricted to specific folders only on the external storage.  Upon scan it adds any sound files that it can play from the internal storage, despite giving the option to pick specific folders on the internal storage.
 
HibyMusic: The biggest drawback of this player is that it sorts the items in the library in Artist>Album>Track view by track name and not track #.  It seems to be quite a new player, so hopefully it will be fixed soon.  It is free without any ads, atm, and a great alternative to DeadBeef if the folder browser is the preferred method of picking songs to play.
 
DeadBeef, ArmAmp: Both of these do not have libraries and the only way to pick music to play is by adding files from a file browser.  The real problem is the way the file browser and the now playing list interact, which is not very logical and intuitive and takes extra steps.  All in all not very fun experience and of the two DeadBeef is definitely preferred for supporting album art and not having an unresponsive interface while playing music like ArmAmp.
 
foobar2000: Awesome as ever, unfortunately missing an equalizer atm.
 
Stellio:  This is another great new player, only let down by presence of crackles during playback.  Playing with different buffer settings did not help to mitigate the problem.  Judging from the settings of the other players, it is currently missing a setting to change the process priority for the audio engine.
 
N7player: This player does appear to use its own sound engine, but unfortunately no matter the settings I tried to change I could not get a perfect gapless playback.  The developers should also abandon their unique library view as it is completely useless.  It does offer a regular library view, however, within the extra press of button.
 
GoneMad, PowerAmp, PlayerPro, Nutron: These are the best premium players currently available for Android.  GoneMad has the cleanest and most customizable interface, Neutron has by far the most advanced audio engine and PowerAmp is the most popular choice and probably the most solid and constantly updated.  PlayerPro falls somewhere between GoneMad and PowerAmp.

Poweramp is better, because is support a nice skins. "Skin for Poweramp Suru" - is an amazing. Other apps looks very very bad.

The only thing I don't like about PowerAmp is I find it sounds warm compared to Neutron. It would be great if the sound was more balanced without having to mess with the EQ.