Tidal :O .. Spotify -_-

Music Talk
1

So tidal is not available in my country but I just clicked on a preview (the one you can listen for few seconds) and wow… Treble is sweet Bass is weighted everything sounded like HD. Anyone knows what bitrate is their preview? Doesn’t tell me ont the preview page.

Comparing the same albums and songs spotify sounded like youtube. But spotify free account bitrate is 160 and tidal is maybe teasing with cd or master quality so that might be the reason?

Currently I’m trying and browsing all of the providers to decide. I’ll give 2 examples if anyone can test for me please on CD quality or 320 for both tidal and spotify on desktop app?

2Pac - 2 of amerikaz most wanted (explicit)
Claptone - Ghost (feat. clap your hands yeah)
Both of these sound way better on tidal than spotify for the free preview versions.

2

Also is this true: " Apple Music is higher quality because its using a 256kbps AAC bitrate, compared to the max 320kbps Ogg Vorbis bitrate used by Spotify " ?

3

What country? Qobuz or Deezer might be services that do lossless streaming for you to check out.

Sounds like Apple marketing to me. I’ve used Spotify 320 extensively and did use 256 AAC when buying songs from iTunes was the thing. To my ear Spotify premium isn’t quite as good as lossless CD quality but there is a discernible difference if you listen for it. It’s been too long since I’ve heard 256 AAC to meaningfully comment.

4

Thanks deezer is available.
Still want to know Tidal preview bitrate it sounded so good compared to the rest previews (120-160).

5

That I don’t know.

6

hm

It says normal but when I click on it it shows a true mark on master.

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7

Not all tracks are remastered, so you will find some that only come in lower bitrates regardless of what subscription tier you’re on.

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8

Yeah but what i’m trying to find is why their preview sounds better than spotify and other previews which are 120-160 for the same songs. Not sure if their player is better or their streaming source has to do something with it :upside_down_face: :upside_down_face: .

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9

Ah, well their quality levels can be seen here: https://www.whattowatch.com/news/what-bitrate-does-tidal-play-back

As for why they sound better than Spotify, hard to know. Tidal is owned by Jay-Z so maybe he has better contacts for digital distribution than Spotify (which is a European company the industry doesn’t particularly like), meaning he could get cleaner versions of the master. If Spotify is picking them up through third parties they may have been re-encoded several times with lower quality encoders.

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10

That could be it.
Also what that true mark means if it shows “normal” but true mark on master in the screenshot? maybe means master quality available?

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11

That’s just your app-wide quality setting, you could pick any of those options and it would only play tracks at that quality or lower (for bandwidth reasons I suppose).

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12

alright thanks mate.

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13

Spotify and Tidal are different kind of streaming platforms, imo. Tidal/ Deezer/ Qoubuz are losseless streaming platforms.

if you’re primarily using bluetooth to stream audio spotify is really good. but if you have the setup to take advantage of loseless playback, tidal is a must have.

regarding bit rates, i’ve checked the tracks you listed using USB audio player pro to play Tidal. they are as follows;

2Pac - 2 of amerikaz most wanted (explicit) - 44.1 Khz, 16 bit, 1015 Kbps
Claptone - Ghost (feat. clap your hands yeah) - 44.1 Khz, 16 bit, 919 Kbps.

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14

Thanks :smiley:

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16

Download Tidal music with MQA quality and put them in software to view its bit rate and sample.

17

No. Lower kilobytes per second means lossier music. Not studio quality music necessarily.

18

Please give me album or E.P. names for songs “2 of Amerikaz Most Wanted” by 2Pac and “Ghost” by Claptone featuring Clap Your Hands Yeah. Bitrates can be different per album and E.P.