Music to our ears?(Spotify, Apple Music or Tidal)

These three are considered giants of the music industry, but which one stands superior to the others?

A study by Edison Research says that Americans listen to up to four hours of audio a day, that’s a lot of time spent listening to music, videos etc. How we stream this audio is a whole different story, Spotify, Apple Music an Tidal are three giants in the music streaming service. As of March 2nd Spotify’s numbers were at an astonishing 50 million subscribers while Apple Music trailed with 20 million as of December and Tidal was far behind with a total of 800,000 subscribers in March of 2016.

Subscription Price and perks

We start with the pricing of these three music services, Apple Music gives two separate plans for Apple Music customers after the initial three month free trial,  there is the individual plan which is $9.99 a month, the student(college) plan for $4.99 a month  and the family sharing plan which is $14.99 a month and can be used for up to six people on an ICloud family sharing program. With an iPhone the perks of Apple Music are Siri can launch any song on your playlist, your iTunes library can integrate with your Apple Music playlist and Beats 1 radio station. This is one of the large perks of Apple Music, many artists that have exclusive deals with the company debut their albums on different radio shows on the station. These include Drake’s recent album More Life premiered first on the station.
Spotify also has multiple plans these include a free plan(none of the other two streaming services mentioned have this option), a $9.99 monthly plan, a $4.99 student subscription plan and a $14.99 family plan. Their monthly, student and  family plan stack up identical to the subscription plans that Apple Music offer but some people can use the app for free. Some perks of Spotify include places you can stream music, such as your PlayStation 4, Amazon Echo and all Smartphones. Spotify also has a free streaming plan where you can view their entire catalog of over 30 million songs. Hi-fi streaming service may also soon be coming to Spotify, which is a higher level of sound quality.
Tidal has two plans to choose from one is the basic $9.99 streaming plan and the other is a $19.99 streaming plan that includes hi-fi sound. Tidal also has some exclusives such as some of Jay-Z’s albums and they were the first to obtain the Prince discography after he passed away and released rapper Future’s Mix-tape. They are also the only company as of this post to offer Hi-Fi Streaming.

How do these companies outdo each other?
Exclusive deals and signing artists have been a long time way of one-upping another service. Apple music had strong pulls such as Taylor Swift, whose entire catalog of albums is Apple Music only with only a couple appearing on Tidal. Spotify is in the dark when it comes to music by Taylor Swift. Some of music industries biggest names such as UMG’s  Lucian Grainge have decided to fight against this practice of offering exclusives to the streaming service. This decision came two days after Blond an album by Frank Ocean was released first exclusively  on Apple Music according to Bob Lefsetz. UMG is the only label at the moment curating a ban on exclusive deals. This was a main way the Apple Music and Tidal were trying to catch on to Spotify and dethrone them as the leader in streaming services but with the ban’s being curated it makes it easier for Spotify to keep it’s ground.

Services offered by each service
Radio: With Spotify when choosing a artists radio you are able to get many songs and artist that relate to that artist or song but not much else except similarities. Tidal gives you realistically the same thing as Spotify with music and artist radio stations. Apple Music is the clear cut leader of the radio battle between the three offering Beats 1 24 hour radio stations with special hosts, new music and more. Apple Music also has non musical radio stations such as BBC, ESPN and NPR, with this large variety of radio stations Apple Music is ahead of the competitors with radio stations for everyone.
Radio Winner: Apple Music
Personal Playlists and Music Discovery: Apple Music has a share and create your own playlist feature which helps share music among friends, it also tailor makes playlist specifically for you with albums that Apple Music feels like you would like to listen to. Tidal also has a create and share playlist feature. Spotify offers a multitude of user generated content and playlists. One of it’s two biggest playlists our new music playlists that come out every Friday and a release radar playlist that debuts all types of new music from artists. This gives user one place to discover all the latest songs. Users are also able to upload their playlists to Spotify for everyone to listen to, these include public playlists and playlists shared among friends. Spotify also allows you to follow your friends and keep tabs on what they are listening to and what they like. Every Monday on Spotify you have a new Discover Weekly playlist that has music tailor made for you, it includes up to two hours of playback with music that you have not listened to before and deep cuts from artists you love. With all these outstanding options Spotify takes a win in Personalizing your music.
Personal Playlist and Music Discovery Winner: Spotify
Usability of Apps and websites: Apple Music has an easy bottom screen with the search tab a library Tab a browse Tab and radio tab. All these features are easily accessible and Apple Music is usable with Siri, just say your command and Siri brings it up. This feature though is exclusive to iPhone only taking away from android users. Tidal has all of the same features to find music through the sidebar on the app with playlists, search bar and a place for your music. Spotify has many sub categories and categories to store music and has a higher output of where it can be streamed then any of the other two. Spotify works with top tech items such as the Google Chromecast, Amazon Echo, and Playstation 4(Covered by Cps Warranties https://www.cpscentral.com/). The Amazon Echo system also responds to commands such as “Alexa play Spotify”. At the end of the day with the easiness to move around the app/website and the amount of music output, Spotify again holds the upper edge against the other two.
Winner in Usability of Apps and websites: Spotify.
With all the different comparisons made one thing is evident and it is that Spotify still reigns supreme over Apple Music and Tidal and without exclusive contracts it should continue to do so.

*All electronic items mentioned in the article are covered by CPS warranties, visit us at https://www.cpscentral.com/ for more details today.

Justin Kushnir is a tech blogger at CPS Central who researches highly enticing tech topics and puts out blog posts every Monday. His post range from Music to gaming to sports and everything in between! Make sure to visit our website every Monday for more posts by Justin.