Ever since their respective U.S. launches, I’ve maintained premium subscriptions with both Spotify and Apple Music. However, my engagement with Apple’s ecosystem extends even further back, given that I’ve been using iTunes since its inception. This long-standing relationship with both platforms uniquely positions me to discuss their strengths and weaknesses, particularly in 2023, a year when each service has solidified its identity, for better or worse.
Before I delve into specifics, there’s one crucial point I need to clarify. My interaction with Spotify is exclusively for music. Originally a music-focused platform, Spotify expanded its scope when it recognized the need for greater profitability. I don’t criticize this expansion, but I do take issue when it affects the music experience, a point I’ll elaborate on later. For podcast and audiobook content, I gravitate towards superior platforms like Overcast and Audible.
Music Catalog
Regarding their music catalogs, both services claim to offer “over 100 million songs”. However, I’d advise a degree of skepticism with this statement. From personal experience, Apple Music seems to provide a more extensive selection, especially when it comes to older albums, compilations, and artists who’ve recently chosen to remove their music from Spotify. Generally, most users may not notice a difference in availability between the two platforms. While Spotify does offer some exclusive “Spotify sessions,” Apple counters with its own unique content too. Despite my slight bias towards Apple Music in terms of availability, the overall comparison essentially results in a draw.
Winner: Draw
Mobile App Design
When it comes to design, Spotify and Apple Music adopt contrasting methodologies. Apple’s propensity for aesthetically pleasing design is evident in Apple Music. Their mobile app, flaunting a clean and beautiful interface teeming with appealing UI elements, is further enriched by the impending iOS 17 update, which promises a delightful mobile experience.
However, the Apple Music app isn’t devoid of imperfections. Some essential features, such as the like/dislike buttons that help tune the algorithm, are buried in sub-menus. The search function, despite recent enhancements, still lags behind Spotify in speed. Also, some excellent desktop power-user features have yet to find their way to the mobile app. Additionally, users with older devices have reported that Apple Music’s app navigation is slower than Spotify’s, although I personally haven’t experienced any notable slowdowns.
In contrast, Spotify’s app can be described as chaotic. The UI is subject to frequent changes and inconsistent addition or removal of features, often without prior notice. Spotify attributes this to A/B testing, but these unpredictable alterations can lead to vastly different user experiences. For instance, Spotify’s “Canvas” feature, which displays looping videos during song playback, was removed from my account for over a year before it was unexpectedly reinstated. Various Reddit threads illustrate this inconsistency, with users reporting dissimilar home screens and functionality. My belief is that premium users should be given the option to opt-out of A/B testing; it’s highly frustrating to pay for a service and witness free users gaining access to exclusive features.
Earlier this year, Spotify introduced a TikTok-inspired interface, met with immediate criticism. Although they’ve since toned it down somewhat, the presence of these looping video cards in certain parts of the app exemplifies a company seemingly out of touch with its customers’ needs. Incessant, aimless design changes only sow confusion and overload their technical support.
Another gripe with Spotify revolves around its lyrics feature. Unlike Apple, which empowers artists to upload official, time-synced lyrics, Spotify relies exclusively on Musixmatch, a crowd-sourced platform prone to errors or omissions. Even when a song includes lyrics, following them isn’t nearly as effortless as on Apple Music. The entire feature feels underdeveloped and has shown little improvement since its launch.
However, Spotify’s app excels in handling music queuing, an aspect consistently critiqued in Apple Music’s mobile offering. The consensus in online discussions often leans towards Spotify’s intuitive approach compared to Apple’s convoluted method. Oddly, Apple Music’s desktop app emulates Spotify’s queue system, yet fails to carry this over to the mobile platform.
Both apps carry their unique strengths and weaknesses, but for me, the greatest issue with Spotify is the inability to customize my experience. I primarily use Spotify for music, not podcasts or audiobooks, yet the app continues to recommend these mediums without the option to disable these suggestions. This has been a significant deterrent over the years. As a premium user, I believe I should be able to filter out unwanted recommendations and tailor my app experience to music alone. If Spotify wishes to promote these features to free users as an incentive to upgrade, that’s reasonable. However, the relentless pushing of services I don’t wish to use ultimately diminishes my experience as a paying customer.
Winner: Apple Music
Desktop App
Spotify has long held the advantage in terms of the desktop experience compared to Apple Music, but recent improvements by Apple are narrowing this gap, while Spotify seems to have stumbled, failing to maintain their lead.
Spotify’s desktop app stands out for its speed, responsiveness, and cross-platform availability. Besides a custom EQ, the desktop app offers few frills. Its primary selling point over the mobile version is the friend’s feed, making it simple to keep tabs on your friends’ music preferences. Furthermore, many of the design issues that burden the mobile app haven’t found their way to the desktop version. However, a recent redesign of Spotify’s desktop app has been met with largely negative feedback, as it seems to have increased clutter and navigational difficulties.
On the other hand, Apple Music’s desktop app is built atop the already cumbersome iTunes app. Despite a rewrite designed to make the macOS app more system-native, it remains clunky when compared to the superior iOS and iPadOS versions. For Windows users, Apple Music has traditionally been accessed via iTunes, but a new Windows Preview app offering a native Apple Music experience has been well-received.
Apple Music’s edge in the desktop arena stems from its power-user features, with “smart playlists” being my personal favorite. These allow the creation of dynamic playlists based on numerous user-defined triggers. For instance, you can generate a playlist of all songs in your library released between 2010–2020 that you’ve listened to more than three times, or songs released over the past decade that you haven’t heard in over 356 days. This feature offers almost endless possibilities for re-exploring your music library. It’s perplexing that such a feature is confined to desktop use, although the smart playlists you create will appear on your mobile app. Third-party mobile apps, such as Miximum, offer similar functionalities.
Despite the strengths and weaknesses of both desktop apps, Spotify holds the advantage, primarily due to its speed and responsiveness. Additionally, Spotify supports Linux with a dedicated desktop app, while Apple Music is confined to macOS and Windows platforms. Nevertheless, both offer a web-based player compatible with any browser.
Winner: Spotify
Sound Quality
In terms of audio quality, Apple emerges as the clear champion. In fact, not only does Apple offer better audio quality than Spotify, the same is true for just about all of Spotify’s streaming music competitors. Spotify Premium users can only avail themselves of the “very high” audio quality setting, which equates to “approximately 320kbit/s.” In contrast, virtually every song in Apple Music’s library is available for lossless streaming, an uncompressed format that offers a listening experience akin to that of a CD. Additionally, Apple Music features albums that can be streamed at hi-res lossless, which delivers an even superior sound quality than CDs, with the right hardware. Apple Music’s standout feature, however, is Dolby Atmos, which they brand as “Spatial Audio.” Both lossless and Dolby Atmos are included with Apple Music at no additional charge.
Before diving into the specifics of music quality, a couple of points merit mentioning. Firstly, Apple Music’s lossless audio can only be accessed via a wired headphone connection, as it is currently impossible to stream lossless audio over Bluetooth. Secondly, some argue that the difference between Lossless and 320kbit/s is practically indistinguishable. While I concur that the distinction isn’t stark, as someone who notices the disparity, especially when using high-end equipment, I choose not to engage in this debate.
The difference that truly is like night and day is Dolby Atmos. Unlike stereo, Dolby Atmos, or Spatial Audio, is a virtual surround sound technology that envelops you in music. When mixed properly, it can create an immersive experience, as though you’re sharing a room with the musicians, exposing instruments and melodies that might be lost in a stereo mix. The beauty of Spatial Audio is that it doesn’t require any special hardware — it is compatible with any pair of headphones. If you use AirPods or specific Beats headphones, Dolby Atmos will activate automatically, while all other headphones require you to enable an “always on” option in your settings.
It’s noteworthy to mention that Spotify announced plans to introduce lossless music, named Spotify HiFi, back in February 2021. However, it’s still not available. Leaks suggest it will be included in a new “Supremium” tier launching later this year, but these leaks don’t mention Dolby Atmos support, a feature quickly becoming an industry standard in music streaming. Each day Spotify continues to offer only 320kbit/s stereo strengthens the argument that it no longer prioritizes music.
Winner: Apple Music
Music Recommendations
Inquire about what endears Spotify to its users and you’ll commonly hear, “the algorithm gets me.” For years, I shared this sentiment and discovered many brilliant artists through it. Early on, when juxtaposed against Apple Music’s recommendation engine, Spotify’s discovery experience was leaps and bounds ahead, leading to an assumption of its invincibility.
However, the landscape has transformed significantly over the recent years. Apple Music has not only managed to level the playing field, but has even outshone Spotify in certain areas. Although some might perceive this as a sacrilegious statement, I urge you to continue reading.
It’s important to recognize that Spotify’s personalized recommendations are entirely driven by algorithms, while Apple utilizes a blend of algorithmic and human curations. Spotify delivers its suggestions in the form of dynamically generated playlists that evaluate a range of factors, such as listeners’ habits with similar taste profiles, to propose new songs you might enjoy. They accomplish this through a series of recurring daily and weekly auto-generated playlists like “Discover Weekly” or “Daily Mix.” Users can also curate playlists based on their favored songs and artists for similar recommendations.
Apple’s recommendations are also diverse, but this might be why newer Apple Music users criticize Apple’s offerings. Apple’s weekly personalized playlists are entirely algorithm-based and might disappoint new users. This is because Apple Music requires time to learn your taste profile and adjust accordingly. Fortunately, Apple’s like/dislike options, as well as other actions like adding a song to your library or playlist, listening to a song/album/artist/genre repeatedly, sharing songs, and more can refine your recommendations. An easy method is to utilize one’s “personal radio station,” a mix of familiar songs and new suggestions. I advise users to focus on liking/disliking songs here and on their weekly auto-generated playlists under the “For You” section to fine-tune their algorithm more quickly.
Once Apple Music understands your preferences, I believe you’ll notice that your experience is not just the same, but you’re actually discovering more new music through Apple. Not only has the algorithm discerned my unique tastes to the point where my “Listen Now” homepage is always brimming with fantastic album recommendations, but creating stations from artists I love has introduced me to an array of new artists, a feat I haven’t experienced on Spotify as much lately.
It’s also important to educate or remind users about a disconcerting truth concerning Spotify — many recommendations users receive are paid placements. Spotify isn’t overtly secretive about this, but it isn’t as transparent as some might prefer. As an indie music enthusiast, I noticed that the same artists keep appearing in my daily mixes and other personalized playlists, usually from indie artists signed to labels capable of affording these placements. While it’s not traditional “payola,” it feels strikingly similar to what payola in the streaming world might look like.
In conclusion, both services offer impressive discovery features. Unfortunately, Apple is at a disadvantage due to its previous shortcomings with algorithmically driven recommendations tarnishing its reputation. However, I can guarantee that if you dedicate time to train it and create stations from artists and songs you appreciate, you’ll find that Apple Music is as effective, if not superior in some aspects, compared to Spotify.
Winner: Draw
Library Management
Library management might not be a feature that piques everyone’s interest, but for music collectors like myself, it plays a pivotal role in our listening experience.
Apple Music triumphs in this area as library management is inherently woven into its service. The ability to establish a virtual music archive and organize those songs into playlists or into dynamically crafted smart playlists is a major allure for Apple Music. In contrast, Spotify offers a rudimentary set of features for library management, which isn’t surprising, given that Spotify’s core focus revolves around playlists.
Moreover, Apple Music’s handling of pre-releases is far superior. When an artist announces a new album, users can pre-add it to their library and as new singles become available, they are ungrayed and ready to be streamed. There’s no need to resort to dubious pre-save services that require relinquishing access to your account and personal data (seriously, avoid third-party pre-save services!). Spotify, on the other hand, creates an individual single for each song from a new album, leading to an excessively cluttered library and multiple artwork versions for songs. To be fair, Spotify has permitted a limited number of artists to use a native pre-add to library feature, but this is only accessible to a select set of artists for now.
One of the standout features of Apple Music is the iCloud Music Library. This feature enables users to upload songs, not available in the streaming catalogue, to the cloud and have them accessible across all devices where they use Apple Music. This is particularly beneficial for exclusive releases, live bootlegs, remixes, and demos that aren’t available for streaming. It’s an incredibly seamless feature that I’m surprised Apple doesn’t highlight more, especially since incorporating music into Spotify, that’s not available for streaming, can be a complicated process.
However, just as Apple Music’s exquisite design could benefit from some refinement, the same applies to their library management. Persistent bugs that randomly split an album into two have been a nuisance for years. This usually happens due to backend metadata updates by the artist or label, but in 2023, the software should be savvy enough to conceal these changes from users and avoid visible and irritating bugs. Additionally, there’s a peculiar quirk where erasing an album from your library also removes any songs from the playlists they’ve been added to. I’ve submitted numerous feedback and emails to Apple, urging them to at least provide an option to delete something from the library while keeping the songs in playlists. Hopefully, they’ll implement this soon.
Winner: Apple Music
Social Features
Both Apple Music and Spotify incorporate social features, but Spotify has a significant lead in this aspect. Every aspect of Spotify seems geared towards sharing and social connectivity, from observing your friends’ music choices to crafting blended playlists with a close friend or family member. Owing to its massive popularity, Spotify has become the go-to service for sharing songs, a fact supported by its standing as one of the few services to provide a free streaming tier. Additionally, many of these social features are activated by default, leading to a vibrant culture of playlist sharing and discovery unparalleled by their competitors.
Apple does offer social features, but they require users to opt-in, making it significantly more challenging to discover playlists from unknown users. While you can connect with friends, you can’t see what they’re listening to in real-time. You can only see what’s displayed on their profile, if you’re on an album page that your friend also listens to, or a selection from a weekly auto-generated playlist called “Friends Mix,” which showcases songs your friends have been enjoying.
Personally, I am indifferent towards the social features, but I acknowledge that they are crucial to many users and an area where Apple needs to bolster if they want to level up the competition. With the advent of iOS 17, Apple is introducing collaborative playlists and SharePlay over CarPlay, two features that will help to narrow the gap with Spotify. However, unless Apple opens up Apple Music further and promotes more friend connections and playlist sharing, it’s a formidable challenge.
Winner: Spotify
Bells & Whistles
Each platform possesses unique strengths and certain limitations, and I’ve tried to outline the major ones that most users care about. Given my extensive experience with both services, I feel it’s worth highlighting some of the additional features that I appreciate from each service, which are missing in the other.
Spotify
- Spotify Connect is an extremely user-friendly feature. It enables users to transition between devices seamlessly and continue their music. It also lets you control one device using another, like using your phone to control the music playing on your desktop. It’s indeed surprising that Apple has not replicated this yet, considering their “Handoff” and “Continuity” features.
- Spotify’s desktop app displays play counts for all songs on an album page, which is a delight for data enthusiasts like me.
- Spotify Wrapped is an enjoyable way to revisit your yearly listening habits.
- The new music tab in the Spotify app is convenient for tracking new releases from your followed artists. While Apple has made improvements in this area, Spotify’s one-tap access is handy.
- Unlike Apple Music’s library limit of 100k songs, Spotify imposes no such limit on its library size.
Apple Music
- The feature ‘Apple Music Sing’ that was introduced earlier this year, allows users to reduce or eliminate the vocals from a song for a karaoke-style experience. If you possess a newer Apple TV, you can replicate the same experience there and host a true karaoke party.
- The desktop app features an excellent mini player that can be conveniently placed at any corner of your desktop, allowing easy access to view what’s playing and control your music without needing to open the full app.
- Apple Music Replay is Apple’s response to Spotify Wrapped. Even though it’s not as comprehensive, it provides a regularly updated site where you can observe your listening habits anytime. It also generates a playlist of your top songs for the year, updating it regularly. Furthermore, it allows you to explore Replay playlists from previous years for a nostalgic journey.
Winner: Draw
Conclusion
For several years, Spotify was my preferred music service. However, their strategic shift towards podcasts and audiobooks has resulted in my growing disinterest. This, combined with the enhancements that Apple has made to their platform, has swayed my preference towards Apple Music, which I believe offers a superior service for true music aficionados.
I recall the peak years of MTV and I’m observing Spotify tread a similar trajectory that eventually led to MTV’s descent as a music giant. Similar to how MTV had to diversify as music videos were not as profitable, Spotify is experiencing the same trend. While I comprehend their need for exploring new revenue sources, it feels as if they are doing so at the expense of the music fans who played a pivotal role in their rise. I recognize that Spotify’s situation differs from Apple’s, as Apple does not rely on the profitability of Apple Music — it primarily serves to boost sales of their iPhones and AirPods.
Setting financial considerations aside, casual listeners who don’t subscribe to Spotify Premium are unlikely to switch. However, if you are a Premium user and share my growing dissatisfaction with Spotify, you might find Apple to be a commendable alternative. In my view, Apple Music gives the impression of a limitless record store, while Spotify feels more akin to scanning through a radio dial. Apple Music’s top-notch recommendations, attractive interface, and impeccable sound quality make it the clear victor in my eyes. Perhaps my sentiments would change if Spotify launches HiFi, hopefully incorporating Dolby Atmos. However, as of now, it’s tough for me to advocate Spotify over Apple Music for individuals for whom music plays a significant role in their lives.
