Tidal vs Spotify

[sonitus mirus]

   
I can detect a reasonable difference between them on my iPhone 6. But that difference does widen when I throw my Chord Mojo into the mix.

 
Is the Chord Hugo still under warranty so you can have it fixed?

 

[MacedonianHero]

   
Is the Chord Hugo still under warranty so you can have it fixed?

? Sorry, I don't have the Hugo. 
 
My comments were that the differences between Tidal and Spotify are greater when using my Mojo with my iPhone.

 

[sonitus mirus]

  ? Sorry, I don't have the Hugo. 
 
My comments were that the differences between Tidal and Spotify are greater when using my Mojo with my iPhone.

 
My fault, I meant the Mojo.  Are you saying "greater" as in the difference is larger between Spotify and Tidal or do you mean "greater" as in better?

 

[MacedonianHero]

   
My fault, I meant the Mojo.  Are you saying "greater" as in the difference is larger between Spotify and Tidal or do you mean "greater" as in better?

Both!

 

[mkarikom]

In an age where we can carry a month's worth of music in a pocket transport, the primary function of radio is music discovery.  I have Tidal HIFI and Spotify and I get way more use out of Spotify.  At 320kbps, mp3 sounds fine out of my portable rig.  Yes the difference is audible, but $1-5k gear still scales noticeably on well-encoded 320 to my ears.  What matters most is that sweet mixes can be readily built from Spotify's huge library, that is if I can't find something awesome in their selection of curated and user-shared mixes, which hasn't happened yet.

 

[SmokeyThePanda]

Completely agreed. Spotify's music collection is the selling point for me. Old music,niche music,new music. Often times Spotify even has early releases on extremely popular songs/albums. You name it,Spotify has it.

 

[duotone]

In the UK, 4 out of the top 5 albums are not currently available.

http://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/four-out-of-the-top-5-albums-in-the-uk-arent-on-spotify/

 

[markus94103]

Tried switching from Spotify Premium to Tidal HiFi, and I hear a noticeable improvement. I had no idea that Tidal was offering lossless streaming! Quite a discovery, thanks guys. I also agree with some of the previous comments, it seems like Spotify Premium's 320 kbps is not always true 320 kbps.

 

[theveterans]

Tried switching from Spotify Premium to Tidal HiFi, and I hear a noticeable improvement. I had no idea that Tidal was offering lossless streaming! Quite a discovery, thanks guys. I also agree with some of the previous comments, it seems like Spotify Premium's 320 kbps is not always true 320 kbps.

Some are 160 kbps if you use Fidelify as the client

 

[markus94103]

Some are 160 kbps if you use Fidelify as the client

 
It's too bad there aren't any consumer protection laws that would make it illegal for Spotify to do this. It feels like fraud to charge for a certain level of quality and then deliver a lower quality product.

 

[theveterans]

 It's too bad there aren't any consumer protection laws that would make it illegal for Spotify to do this. It feels like fraud to charge for a certain level of quality and then deliver a lower quality product.

 
I don't mind it that much since some 160 kbps encodes sounds fantastic to me. But since most people use Spotify as the main app, they won't know that they're actually streaming 160 kbps on some of their offerings so no lawsuit is happening.

 

[reginalb]

Completely agreed. Spotify's music collection is the selling point for me. Old music,niche music,new music. Often times Spotify even has early releases on extremely popular songs/albums. You name it,Spotify has it.

 
You might prefer Google Play Music, the subscription now gives you access to YouTube Red, as well. In the off chance you can't find it in Play Music (which has a bigger selection than Spotify), it's probably on YT, which you can now play in the background and is ad-free because of your Red subscription. If it's not on either, so long as you can get it on to your computer somehow, you can upload it to your own Play Music library, and access it streaming through the app. 
 
I would like to give Deezer a spin should it ever make its way to the U.S. but for now, I think Play Music is the best bang for your buck. Though I suspect you'd use less data with Apple Music, since it likely streams at 256k vs the 320 for Play Music. 

 

[upstateguy]

I would like to recommend reviewing Testing Audiophile Claims and Myths and My Cable Test Enterprise

 

[Vero Golf Champ]

Ok now I think I hear the difference, even thru my portable rig. Been running them in parallel for a couple of months. Tidal HiFi is crisper with more detail and definition. Of course it's very easy to enter the realms of fantasy in this hobby.

 

[krismusic]

Ok now I think I hear the difference, even thru my portable rig. Been running them in parallel for a couple of months. Tidal HiFi is crisper with more detail and definition. Of course it's very easy to enter the realms of fantasy in this hobby.

It doesn't help that Tidal plays louder than Spotify.
Having used both extensively I would say that the real difference in SQ is very small. I like the idea that Tidal is at least trying to work for musicians though.