Spotify (for iPhone) - Review 2022

Best of the year 2022 Bug The highly competitive streaming music space gains and loses services every few years, but ane thing remains the same: Spotify is i of the best music services around. Despite serious competition from other music services—including the audiophile-friendly Tidal and the DJ-axial LiveXLive Powered by Slacker Radio—Spotify is still a elevation player in this crowded category due to its large catalog, collaborative playlists, podcasts, and other attractive features.

Function of Spotify'southward success is its ubiquity. You can access Spotify by launching the spider web player, by downloading the desktop apps (bachelor for Chromebook, Linux, Mac, and Windows), or past installing ane of the mobile apps (bachelor for Android, iOS, and Windows Mobile). Y'all can also find Spotify on TVs, gear up-elevation boxes, smartwatches, and home video game consoles.

The desktop apps take an advantage over the spider web player and mobile apps in that yous can employ the former to play M4P, MP3, and MP4 audio files that are stored in your computer. This is a peculiarly cool feature for people who desire to play all of their music streams and sound files from one central location. Unfortunately, the desktop app isn't compatible with M4A files.

The Android app and iOS app, however, share an extra benefit. On mobile, Spotify has partnered with Genius, 1 of the web's most-popular lyrics sites, to offer Behind The Lyrics. This feature displays key lyrics (but not full lyrics!) as they're sung or rapped. There are no lyrics in the spider web or desktop apps. In addition, Behind The Lyrics delivers behind-the-scenes information, such as song facts or inspirations. Information technology's a cool addition that very much reminds me of VH-ane'south classic Pop-Upwards Video show.

Spotify

Toll Structure

You tin dive into Spotify using one of the 2 listening plans: Spotify Free or Spotify Premium. The free version serves sound and imprint ads every bit you lot listen at 160Kbps, manage your digital music files, and connect with others using the built-in social networking features.

The $9.99-per-month Spotify Premium lets you lot hear select albums before they're released, play songs on demand, and cache songs for offline playback on your computer, phone, or other devices. It also increases audio quality to 320Kbps. Feature- and quality-wise, Premium is worth the extra moolah. That said, Spotify doesn't allow yous record its audio as SiriusXM Cyberspace Radio, the Editors' Pick for streaming services focused on live content, does.

Spotify'south Family Program grants six people individual premium accounts for an incredibly wallet-friendly $14.99 per month. This directly competes with Apple Music and Google Play's $14.99 per month family plans. Apple and Google'south offerings also let six household members subscribe to the service for $xiv.99 per month. A student plan is bachelor for $4.99 per month.

Deep Content Well

Spotify'southward library boasts more than l one thousand thousand songs, plus audiobooks, comedy, radio dramas, podcasts, verse readings, and speeches. It'south a rich collection, and I am pleasantly surprised that information technology includes Dr. Martin Luther Rex's "I Take a Dream" speech in its entirety. Spotify'southward non-music extras, such every bit The Joe Budden Podcast and select Hulu Originals episodes, act as a counter to LiveXLive by Slacker Radio DJs and music history channels, as well as Tidal'due south in-depth music editorials and exclusive videos. That said, Spotify doesn't take many music videos or concert videos. LiveXLive Powered Past Slacker Radio is superior in that regard.

Clicking an creative person's proper name pulls upward additional songs past the creative person, and an About tab that contains an artist's biography, photos, and hyperlinks to related Spotify pages. I killed quite a few minutes in testing leaping from Alicia Keys to Isaac Hayes to Booker T. and The Grand.Grand.'s and reading the in-depth bios and sampling tracks. Withal, LiveXLive Powered by Slacker Radio'southward DNA station does a better task of fleshing out creative person profiles through the use of interviews and playing the music that influenced the artists' sound.

Spotify

The Spotify Feel

Spotify's library won't let yous down. I streamed the entirety of A Tribe Called Quest'south Nosotros Got Information technology From Here...Thanks 4 Your Service, Hannah Williams & The Affirmations' Late Nights & Heartbreak, and Led Zeppelin'due south Led Zeppelin 2. Spotify has a practiced mix of major and indie artists, including Taylor Swift, who in one case had a notable falling out with Spotify over money that saw her remove her catalog from the service.

You can build playlists with any of the tracks or albums in Spotify's deep catalog. By default, Spotify streams tracks on your playlists with gapless playback. Spotify too gives you the option to crossfade songs, and even the ability to adjust the number of seconds (1-12) to fade. It'south not something I use, but DJs (or wannabe DJs) might discover it highly-seasoned. If you desire to build a playlist with a friend, turn on the collaborative playlist selection to let your playlist be edited by others.

Spotify's free 128Kbps and Premium 320Kbps streams audio good. If you listen to Spotify using a laptop or phone during work hours or the morning/evening commute, you'll detect the audio quality satisfactory.

Even so, if you lot want better audio quality, and have a good pair of headphones, you lot should look into Tidal's $19.99-per-month HiFi plan. With it, Tidal delivers non-compressed 1411Kbps FLAC sound that'southward of a much higher fidelity than your standard sound stream. Even better, HiFi includes Tidal Masters, a music drove that offers studio-quality, high-resolution audio streams. They sound terrific.

Besides listening to singles, albums, and playlists, you can create an Artist Radio station that plays music from your favorite musicians, as well equally similar-sounding musicians. I like Harlem'southward Creative person Radio, which served up tunes from Dum Dum Girls and other indie rock notables in testing. Oddly, I was able to skip more than a dozen tracks in the piddling time I spent with Spotify Costless before I upgraded to Spotify Premium; typically, streaming music services like Live by Live Powered past Slacker Radio limit you lot to vi skips. Non that I'one thousand lament. You can, of course, like and ban songs to customize the Creative person Radio experience, as you can with most music-streaming services.

Every bit previously stated, Spotify lacks LiveXLive Powered by Slacker Radio's informative DJs who host particular playlists and the music history-filled Slacker Deoxyribonucleic acid stations. Instead, it has Spotify Sessions, original artist recordings fabricated in Spotify Studios. I tolerated Kelly Clarkson's mediocre embrace of Prince'south "Kiss," but rather enjoyed John Fable'southward "All of Me."

If you're concerned almost streaming your favorite tunes over, say, a public Wi-Fi bespeak, you need to get yourself a VPN. A virtual private network safeguards your phone, tablet, or PC from snoopers and, depending on the location of the VPN server, may let you access music licensed to other regions. Using a VPN to get around licensing restrictions violates Spotify's terms of service, though, then tread carefully.

Spotify Hulu Video

An First-class Streaming Music Service

Simply put, Spotify is an fantabulous streaming music service that wins PCMag Editors' Choice and Readers' Selection awards. It has tons of dandy music, exclusive tunes, and podcasts, all of which combine to brand it a summit selection for streaming music and more than popular culture-related content. If you lot prefer musical deep dives and concert videos, bank check out LiveXLive Powered By Slacker Radio, which is as well an Editors' Choice. If y'all fancy hi-res sound, the Editors' Choice award-winning Tidal is the mode to become.