Apple Music is our enthusiast choice until Tidal knocks it out of the dock, but if you’re an Apple Fan, it’s still a lossless quality option for $11 a month (more than $1 a year ago). For select songs, audio streams in 16-bit, 44.1 kHz or 24-bit, 192 kHz quality. The latter coincides with Tidal’s best efforts. Watching Apple Music and Tidal One-Up and pairing year after year is like watching two racing cars walk around the track, one lap barely leading, the other lap is moving forward on the next lap.
Apple has over 100 million songs in its catalogue, all of which are used in lossless format. There are also some tracks in Dolby Atmosphere. Apple Music’s regular, lossy format streams songs in up to 256 KBPS, which is not significantly different from Spotify’s 320 Kbps.
Apple’s human-curated discovery choices aren’t as interesting as Spotify. Just like on Spotify, you can see what your friends are listening to with social sharing turned on. There are only 100,000 songs in your library, but there is no limit on how many songs you can place in each playlist. Still, it’s Apple for 2024. Release (the track) the masses, if people like, let people drown their libraries.
I love iPhone apps and the Android version is OK, but the desktop app is scary. The song occasionally refuses to play, clicking “Add to Library” rarely works, and the back button is a dysfunctional mess. Adding music to your library is tedious. If you are away from the browsing tab, the Back button takes you to the home screen, so you have to navigate all the way back to the album or artist you are viewing unless it is insensitive to disappear. If you are considering taking action, check out our guide to converting from Spotify to Apple Music.
If you plan to subscribe to Apple Music with Dolby Atmos and lossless audio, you’ll need a pair of Apple-made headphones (using iPhone and HomePod Mini). But if you favor speakers who support Alexa, you may want to consider Amazon Music even if this isn’t one of our most important personal choices.
Apple Music Voice Program has stopped. To be honest: I miss it very much, just like I miss being swarmed by mosquitoes. Since there are few controls, you have to use Siri to control it, you can’t view or make playlists, and you can’t save your favorite songs, artists, or albums. This also means there are no music videos or lyrics. I can go on, but it’s better to forget it.
