The music industry is an ever-changing landscape. There is always a new way to bring music from the artist to the audience. After the decline in the trend of buying singles and albums through online music stores, today’s consumers seem to prefer to subscribe to music streaming services. Let us help you choose the right platform for those who are undecided.
Spotify
One of the popular music subscription services today is Spotify. It is a free tool for listening to and discovering new music. It is available on smartphones, tablets, computers, PlayStation, TVs, cars, Android Wear and Web Player. You can use it to build your collection of songs and organize them into playlists.
Spotify helps you to find new music based on the genres, artists, or songs that you like. There is also a social network where you can chat with your friends, check each other’s music preferences, vote for bands, etc.
However, the free plan has limitations. For example, you need to listen to ads between songs and you cannot listen to your music offline. There is no way to buy and download the songs you hear on Spotify. In other words, everything inside Spotify will always stay inside Spotify. Anyway, you can always use Spotify Premium Mod APK with unlimited access to the above-mentioned features.
Advantages: free version, high bitrate, lightning-fast performance, and many additional features.
Disadvantages: slightly cluttered interface, especially on the desktop app.
Apple Music
Apple Music is Apple’s answer to the growing trend of subscription music consumption. Because it uses the same music collection as the iTunes Store, Apple Music subscribers will have access to the largest music library in the world.
It also offers deep integration with other devices and features within the Apple environment, such as the ability to use Siri voice command to search, navigate, and take other actions. It also includes live coverage of Beats 1 Radio, broadcast worldwide 24 hours a day, 7 days a week from studios in Los Angeles, New York, and London.
Advantages: compatibility with Apple ecosystem without installing additional software, merging with existing media library, high bitrate (256 Kbps, AAC).
Disadvantages: unreliable personal recommendations in case of rare and specific genres.
Google Play Music
Google Play Music will cost the same price: a subscription costs 2-3 dollars a month. Get unlimited access to the song database and the ability to save tracks for offline listening. You can try the service for free for a month.
Google Play Music also offers playlists by mood and creates custom, updated selections based on the tracks you listen to. The song format is 320 Kbps, MP3, which roughly corresponds to 256 Kbps, AAC from Apple.
Advantages: impressive music base at a low price.
Disadvantages: external unattractiveness and angularity of the interface.
Yandex.Music
Streaming service popular in Russia. Its browser version allows unlimited listening to audio recordings without authorization at an acceptable bitrate (192 Kbps). Yandex. Music can sync with Deezer and transfer playlists from Last.FM, generating recommendations based on songs from there. There is also the possibility of migration from Apple Music.
Subscription will increase the bitrate of the tracks up to 320 Kbps. It also removes ads and allows you to listen to tracks offline. The free trial period is one month.
Advantages: the ability to listen to music for free if you use only a desktop browser, a convenient recommendation system, and the availability of exclusive podcasts.
Disadvantages: insufficiently user-friendly interface and a large number of ads in the browser version.
YouTube Music
This Google music service combines streaming and video hosting. The application and the recommendation system are familiar to everyone who used YouTube: you can like tracks and clips on the video platform to transfer them to the service. Access to YouTube Music is included with YouTube Premium.
YouTube Music is available in two versions: free and paid. At first, you will have to put up with advertising inserts and refuse to listen in the background. A peculiar plus of the service: you can find fan clips for tracks in it.
Advantages: powerful and smart search, a large number of music tracks, and live concert recordings in the catalog.
Disadvantages: Not very good sound quality, presence of unlicensed music in playlists, not the most convenient library sorting.
Deezer
Deezer is a French music streaming service that lets you listen to songs, create and rate your own playlists based on your favorites, and group songs or artists into “radio stations”. You can also create a “Hear this” list based on the music you have recently listened to in your collection.
Deezer currently has over 40 million licensed tracks in its library, over 30,000 radio channels, and around 16 million monthly active users.
The service is available free of charge. However, you need to upgrade to a paid plan for $6/month to remove ads between songs, play music offline and listen to songs on mobile devices,
Advantages: more than 56 million songs in the library, the presence of author’s music podcasts.
Disadvantages: not convenient app.
Tidal
This service is famous for its quality of the music: it features FLAC / ALAC format, so audiophiles will be satisfied. Tidal has over 90,000 music videos and 40 million high-quality songs.
The service has several subscription levels: Premium and Hi‑Fi. The first one provides access to music in 320 Kbps, AAC format (MP3 is significantly inferior to AAC even at the same bitrate). Hi‑Fi provides the ability to listen to songs in FLAC and ALAC format.
Advantages: exclusives from many artists, as well as compositions of the highest quality.
Disadvantages: high subscription cost.
SoundCloud
SoundCloud is not so much a streaming service as it is a social network for music lovers. Musicians upload their creations here, and DJs upload remixes. Users then listen to them and discuss. In addition, you can find many records from little-known indie artists on this service.
As the main music platform, SoundCloud is unlikely to suit you. The library is large here, but it is not always possible to find popular musicians. Entire discographies are often the exception here. Nevertheless, the service is great, as an additional source of rare music.
The free version of SoundCloud has almost no restrictions, so you can use it without spending a dime. No ads, no skipping tracks. Unless a certain small percentage of songs are not available and there is no offline mode. To get access to all this, you have to buy a monthly subscription to SoundCloud Go ($4.99) or Go+ ($9.99).
Advantages: the ability to listen to songs even without registration, absence of advertising, and a large amount of indie music.
Disadvantages: small library, lack of many popular artists, not very convenient cataloging.
Jamendo
Everything that we said about SoundCloud also applies to Jamendo. This is a similar service where independent artists upload their music. There are no premium features, so you can listen to audio recordings absolutely free without any restrictions and even download them. Registration in the service is optional.
You won’t be able to use Jamendo as your main source of music. It’s a too small (albeit diverse) library. However, it is quite possible to profit from fresh tracks, meet previously unknown performers or even discover new genres with its help.
Advantages: Free access, no registration required, no ads, and plenty of indie music.
Disadvantages: too modest library.
