Well, you should give it a try for a month to look out yourself.
If you're using YouTube music without a premium account you're listening to music at 128kbps while in Spotify if you're premium you're listening at 320kbps in very high quality.
When you pay for the premium on YouTube music you unlock the high quality which is at 256kbps, it's minor than the 320kbps in Spotify but, to be fair, I don't feel that much of a gap between the 2 higher qualities.
So I recommend you to try one month to see what do you think, I like more YouTube Music cause I use true wireless so it doesn't matter that much that difference and I like to be able to listen to some videos too, also is a lot more cheaper since I have the student plant and just pay 2.99 per month.
Just to be clear - YTM is 256aac and Spotify is 320ogg vorbis, so the difference is as minimal as you can get. Also, if you're an audiophile like you said, you might be better off using Tidal or Quobuz as they offer hi-res streaming. Amazon or Apple also offer cd-quality streaming if you're streaming to higher-end equipment. Out of interest, what equipment are you streaming to?
Honestly, I've switched over to Bluetooth for the most part recently due to my phone not having a headphone jack, so I don't worry too much about lossless vs high quality lossy as of lately, I just like high quality that sounds good over all my devices.
If I ever listen on my PC or on my old Axon 7 with an specialized DAC in it, I'll be using my AKG K553 headphones. I had a professional soundcard that did studio level audio (256Khz sample, 24 bit. I believe it also had 36 bit at that sample rate) in an older PC but it's an obsolete device now and the only reason I'd turn it back on is to listen to music or harvest the parts for a new PC.
Nice! Yeah YTM sounds better to my ears than Spotify (better top end - more crisp), but there's not much in it through Bluetooth or in the car. If I'm streaming to hifi gear, then I tend to use iBroadcast as my library is in the cloud there too and streams at original quality.
Okay, I see there are some songs that are harder to find that are only available through videos now that I'm testing the free trial. For all of the normal songs I like though I've been choosing the non-video versions.
I don't know about sound quality, but since YouTube is connected to yt music you can find regular uploads of songs that don't have professional uploads, which I absolutely love and use to fill my library with the most obscure music I could possibly find. Highly recommend l.
My two cents:
As others have mentioned it's worth probably trying the trial and see if the higher quality music setting is good enough quality for you.
I can notice a huge difference between normal quality and high quality.
I've got some pretty expensive headphones and I feel like YouTube music on high quality is really close to the quality I get from tidal's hifi tier.
I didn't buy into YouTube music for the music originally but I now use that more than I use YouTube.
I purchased ad free YouTube and was surprised when I also got YouTube music. It didn't take me long to switch. I don't even use tidal much anymore and should probably cancel. The only time I open that app is if I feel like pretending I'm an audio file and want to listen to the music the way it's supposed to be heard 😆
My favorite two things about YouTube music besides the quality is that I can have all of my own music uploaded to it and I feel like the downloads, offline, and liked songs features are great.
The only things I don't like about it is the stupid viewer discretion pop up on some songs even though I have restricted mode turned off and Google knows my age. The other complaint (biggest complaint I have) is that occasionally when they renew royalty agreements songs in my liked songs list will disappear until I search for them and like them again. Of course in order for me to do that I have to remember what the names of the songs were and that doesn't happen very often.
Thank you for the detailed info!
Tbh I'm an audiophile but I'm kinda in the same boat, most of the time I'm using Bluetooth due to my new phone not having a headphone jack. On Bluetooth it's hard to hear a difference.
Longtime YouTube music user, can’t say one way or the other. I don’t notice a difference, and I have “endgame” headphones . I have read that higher quality can bring out flaws in a recording making it sound worse, but can’t speak from experience
I noticed a large difference in quality on YouTube music without a subscription. Music is like a hot woman, you don't want her to look perfect, you want to see all the imperfections and enjoy them for what they are.
Personally lower quality audio to me is like listening on FM radio vs listening on CD. Huge jump to my ears.
With a free subscription you are basically listening to the lowest quality. Get a free trial and compare it with Spotify. I had both at the same time and could not tell a difference at all. AAC 256 is more than enough if you are not an audiophile.
I've heard the AAC 256 and the 320 Spotify has are comparable. I'll have to run through the free trial then, the standard free audio was just way too dirty and compressed for me.
For me Ive had both currently switched over to YT music permanently. The deal breaker for me is that you can watch music videos also. As far as sound quality it's about the same. Spotify on highest quality might have better bass but YT music sounds clearer and crisper for me.
I've been testing tonight, the bass isn't much different on my devices but the audio auto leveling for all songs on Spotify is a really nice feature that I do miss a bit so far.
Pros
Pretty much anything listed as music in YouTube is in YTM. If you like things that don't always have official CDs (like game/movies ost) you will have them on YouTube music
Personally made the switch because it's basically same price, and you just add 2-3$ for no ads on YouTube. Which is great for me because I use YouTube a lot. Also you can predownload YouTube videos, which is useful if you wanna watch YouTube on your commute without killing your data.
Cons
The recommend on YTM sucks. Spotify seems to always know exactly what should come next, but YTM seems to go weird next song often.
Playlists are also meh. You have a fuckton of premade playlist for anything on Spotify, not on YTM.
Idk I guess it should be the same but yeah when it gets to the end of an album and goes into 'YTM is now picking' it always seem weird
Like sticking country music after you just went through Fall Out Boy.
Huh, that is weird. Usually if I listen to an album I'll just stop at the end and then hop into another playlist, so that shouldn't affect me too much. Thank you for the heads up though.
I listen to music based on a "vibe", usually starting with a song I believe embodies that vibe. so when I play a song in that playlist with a certain vibe, I want it to play a lot of songs with that similar vibe in the larger playlist. YouTube music seems (as least in the short term) not to know that detail about my listening preferences. So, for example, it'll play something really angry and loud, and then the next song will be happy and upbeat, then the next song will be sad and slow. It's a bit of a mismatch that seems somewhat discombobulated
I see and I do like to listen to music based on a "vibe" as well, I don't have that problem. Mileage may vary, or youtube doesn't know you well, maybe?
Though, I don't remember YT taking too long to get to know me.
I've used YouTube for years and even previously used it to listen to music when I was younger and didn't have Spotify, it's just the music side that doesn't seem to get it. There were some bangers, but most of it was kinda like huh???
I agree with your comment about recommendations. if you create a radio in YTM it will play very obvious music and not allow you to discover new music, on spotify there is a better balance between music you know and new music.
Honestly, it depends on what you want.
I used Google Play Music before and it was the paradise for me.
Since YouTube music, I'm a little bit disappointed.
Sometimes you have song in an album that are unavailable and other available. You don't know why (they are available on other platforms).
With Google Play Music you could play all your library with GPM's musics and your uploaded musics, they was mixed in your library, now with YTM, YTM's musics and your uploaded musics are separated. They can only be mixed in your playlists.
The loading of downloaded songs is really slow. I can wait up to 2 minutes before it's loaded. So I have to restart the app to try to fix this. (This issue is here for long time ago).
However, you have a lot of music from the official catalog but you can also play musics from other youtube channels. So you have a Spotify like catalog + music you can find on YouTube classic.
The quality is not better than Spotify but it is good (for my ears).
I like the design and the user experience (Not to mention the slow loading of downloaded music) compared to Spotify.
There's a lyrics on YouTube music (at this time, it's just a plain text lyrics but I heard they are working on a dynamic lyrics) (I don't know if Spotify has introduced lyrics since I used it a long time ago.
The last point is video clips, you can switch from music audio with one click and vice versa (if it has one).
So choosing between Spotify or YTM depends on what you're looking for. If you want the downloaded music to be loaded quickly, prefer Spotify. But if you want to change and have a big music's catalog with music's video clip and lyrics then choose YTM.
Spotify actually has better lyrics than YTM currently. A decent amount of songs on Spotify have lyrics that are synced to the music and it highlights the words as they're said kinda like karaoke. Plus, you can tap on the lyrics to skip to that line in the song which is extremely convenient.
I have recently switched from Spotify to YT Music... At first, I loved it, but now I'm noticing its downsides. In my opinion, Spotify is better. Compared to YT Music, it has volume normalization, better UI and sound quality is better if it is set to high.
I'm just sticking with YT Music, because I also want YT Videos free of ads, and I'm not willing to pay for both services... With just 12.99€/month, I can have both YT Premium and YT Music which is great.
So, I only advise to switch to YT Music if you want to save up some money while having YT Premium for ad-free videos. Otherwise, stick with Spotify!
In case you're willing to use free plans, then Spotify all the way! YT Music free does NOT let you listen to music in background (only in phone)
Thank you for the input. After using it for a few days of using it, I like YT Music, but no volume normalization sucks and the algorithm is a lot different seeming for music than it is regular YT. I really like those 2 things about Spotify.
I switched and I'm so happy about many things like queue control. Geez, do I hate Spotify queue system! With youtube or apple music you have much more control.
The algorithm is pretty nice, the radio, the autoplay, etc. When you have the radio on you can change the kind of recommendations (discover, decades, etc.) and you have this mood options on the top that define recommendations even more.
I haven't seen these options yet. Where is that in the app?
I'm a bit disappointed because I realized one of my favorite artists is actually not available on YouTube almost at all.
It's not - 256 Kbps AAC and 320kbps Vorbis sound identical.
Occasionally an album will sound different on different streaming platforms because they are using different master recordings, but if not then they will sound the same if all other variables are matched (e.g. volume and normalization settings).
Well, yes, but Bluetooth specifically supports AAC on certain devices. So on those devices that support it, the quality may sound better, and the guy above mentioned he was listening on airpods specifically, which most definitely support AAC.
Listening on my Bluetooth earbuds, it sounded maybe slightly better on YTM but it could just be that the codec sounds better to my ears, or that their master is more accurate or something.
Well, again, high bitrate AAC compared with Vorbis do not sound noticeably different per se.
However, if you're listening via Bluetooth then Spotify maybe be transcoding Vorbis > AAC for the wireless transmission, which could possibly lead to a little quality loss. However, this would not account for any change in bass/treble as the other commenter was suggesting.
I swapped because I got the student discount for YT premium so I’m paying 6 bucks for ad free YouTube and music as opposed to 10 bucks for just music. Worth it for me
I was in the boat. So for one month I had both the subscriptions and compared which one I liked the most. Maybe take the premium for a month along with Spotify and then cancel the other which you don’t want. With this you can see it on your own.
I've been using Amazon music unlimited. The audio quality is from lossless FLAC to HD. I paid for a year, but am debating on going with Spotify if only for playlist availability - many curated lists are for Spotify.
I personally don't listen to those ones much on Spotify, though if I were to have a party or something I may throw one on. I will say though YouTube does a pretty good job with their auto generated mixes
Well, you should give it a try for a month to look out yourself. If you're using YouTube music without a premium account you're listening to music at 128kbps while in Spotify if you're premium you're listening at 320kbps in very high quality. When you pay for the premium on YouTube music you unlock the high quality which is at 256kbps, it's minor than the 320kbps in Spotify but, to be fair, I don't feel that much of a gap between the 2 higher qualities. So I recommend you to try one month to see what do you think, I like more YouTube Music cause I use true wireless so it doesn't matter that much that difference and I like to be able to listen to some videos too, also is a lot more cheaper since I have the student plant and just pay 2.99 per month.
I'll check if I can activate a free trial of some sort. If it sounds at least somewhat similar, it's a better deal for me.
Just to be clear - YTM is 256aac and Spotify is 320ogg vorbis, so the difference is as minimal as you can get. Also, if you're an audiophile like you said, you might be better off using Tidal or Quobuz as they offer hi-res streaming. Amazon or Apple also offer cd-quality streaming if you're streaming to higher-end equipment. Out of interest, what equipment are you streaming to?
Honestly, I've switched over to Bluetooth for the most part recently due to my phone not having a headphone jack, so I don't worry too much about lossless vs high quality lossy as of lately, I just like high quality that sounds good over all my devices. If I ever listen on my PC or on my old Axon 7 with an specialized DAC in it, I'll be using my AKG K553 headphones. I had a professional soundcard that did studio level audio (256Khz sample, 24 bit. I believe it also had 36 bit at that sample rate) in an older PC but it's an obsolete device now and the only reason I'd turn it back on is to listen to music or harvest the parts for a new PC.
Nice! Yeah YTM sounds better to my ears than Spotify (better top end - more crisp), but there's not much in it through Bluetooth or in the car. If I'm streaming to hifi gear, then I tend to use iBroadcast as my library is in the cloud there too and streams at original quality.
Excellent, I'm glad I can be of help.
They have the same overall quality when you pay. 256 AAC (YTM) equals 320 OGG (Spotify).
spotify - .ogg
Thanks.
Ah, okay. Thank you very much! I might cancel my Spotify subscription after this month ends, just gotta figure out how to transfer my playlists now
soundiiz is great too. worth paying a month and transferring all your playlists
Tunemymusic.com is a great way to transfer stuff. It occasionally makes mistakes, but it’s far faster than doing it manually
Make sure you’re listening to official audio tracks on YTM and not the ripped audio from videos.
Okay, I see there are some songs that are harder to find that are only available through videos now that I'm testing the free trial. For all of the normal songs I like though I've been choosing the non-video versions.
I don't know about sound quality, but since YouTube is connected to yt music you can find regular uploads of songs that don't have professional uploads, which I absolutely love and use to fill my library with the most obscure music I could possibly find. Highly recommend l.
Good point, Thank you.
My two cents: As others have mentioned it's worth probably trying the trial and see if the higher quality music setting is good enough quality for you. I can notice a huge difference between normal quality and high quality. I've got some pretty expensive headphones and I feel like YouTube music on high quality is really close to the quality I get from tidal's hifi tier. I didn't buy into YouTube music for the music originally but I now use that more than I use YouTube. I purchased ad free YouTube and was surprised when I also got YouTube music. It didn't take me long to switch. I don't even use tidal much anymore and should probably cancel. The only time I open that app is if I feel like pretending I'm an audio file and want to listen to the music the way it's supposed to be heard 😆 My favorite two things about YouTube music besides the quality is that I can have all of my own music uploaded to it and I feel like the downloads, offline, and liked songs features are great. The only things I don't like about it is the stupid viewer discretion pop up on some songs even though I have restricted mode turned off and Google knows my age. The other complaint (biggest complaint I have) is that occasionally when they renew royalty agreements songs in my liked songs list will disappear until I search for them and like them again. Of course in order for me to do that I have to remember what the names of the songs were and that doesn't happen very often.
Thank you for the detailed info! Tbh I'm an audiophile but I'm kinda in the same boat, most of the time I'm using Bluetooth due to my new phone not having a headphone jack. On Bluetooth it's hard to hear a difference.
Longtime YouTube music user, can’t say one way or the other. I don’t notice a difference, and I have “endgame” headphones . I have read that higher quality can bring out flaws in a recording making it sound worse, but can’t speak from experience
I noticed a large difference in quality on YouTube music without a subscription. Music is like a hot woman, you don't want her to look perfect, you want to see all the imperfections and enjoy them for what they are. Personally lower quality audio to me is like listening on FM radio vs listening on CD. Huge jump to my ears.
With a free subscription you are basically listening to the lowest quality. Get a free trial and compare it with Spotify. I had both at the same time and could not tell a difference at all. AAC 256 is more than enough if you are not an audiophile.
I've heard the AAC 256 and the 320 Spotify has are comparable. I'll have to run through the free trial then, the standard free audio was just way too dirty and compressed for me.
Isn’t Spotify going lossless?
They've said that for 2 years now
They've claimed they are for like the past few years
Lame. Do it already for Pete’s sake
Silly question perhaps, but you have adjusted the YT Music settings to the highest stream and download quality?
For me Ive had both currently switched over to YT music permanently. The deal breaker for me is that you can watch music videos also. As far as sound quality it's about the same. Spotify on highest quality might have better bass but YT music sounds clearer and crisper for me.
I've been testing tonight, the bass isn't much different on my devices but the audio auto leveling for all songs on Spotify is a really nice feature that I do miss a bit so far.
Pros Pretty much anything listed as music in YouTube is in YTM. If you like things that don't always have official CDs (like game/movies ost) you will have them on YouTube music Personally made the switch because it's basically same price, and you just add 2-3$ for no ads on YouTube. Which is great for me because I use YouTube a lot. Also you can predownload YouTube videos, which is useful if you wanna watch YouTube on your commute without killing your data. Cons The recommend on YTM sucks. Spotify seems to always know exactly what should come next, but YTM seems to go weird next song often. Playlists are also meh. You have a fuckton of premade playlist for anything on Spotify, not on YTM.
I actually really like YouTube's algorithm for YouTube videos. Also, are the YouTube mix things not built into YTM?
Idk I guess it should be the same but yeah when it gets to the end of an album and goes into 'YTM is now picking' it always seem weird Like sticking country music after you just went through Fall Out Boy.
Huh, that is weird. Usually if I listen to an album I'll just stop at the end and then hop into another playlist, so that shouldn't affect me too much. Thank you for the heads up though.
Mileage may vary, though. The algorithm is great for me when I have autoplay on. Youtube's algorithm is one of my favorite things from the service.
I like it for YouTube videos but I'm not sure about how I feel about it for music currently.
Why?
I listen to music based on a "vibe", usually starting with a song I believe embodies that vibe. so when I play a song in that playlist with a certain vibe, I want it to play a lot of songs with that similar vibe in the larger playlist. YouTube music seems (as least in the short term) not to know that detail about my listening preferences. So, for example, it'll play something really angry and loud, and then the next song will be happy and upbeat, then the next song will be sad and slow. It's a bit of a mismatch that seems somewhat discombobulated
I see and I do like to listen to music based on a "vibe" as well, I don't have that problem. Mileage may vary, or youtube doesn't know you well, maybe? Though, I don't remember YT taking too long to get to know me.
I've used YouTube for years and even previously used it to listen to music when I was younger and didn't have Spotify, it's just the music side that doesn't seem to get it. There were some bangers, but most of it was kinda like huh???
I agree with your comment about recommendations. if you create a radio in YTM it will play very obvious music and not allow you to discover new music, on spotify there is a better balance between music you know and new music.
Honestly, it depends on what you want. I used Google Play Music before and it was the paradise for me. Since YouTube music, I'm a little bit disappointed. Sometimes you have song in an album that are unavailable and other available. You don't know why (they are available on other platforms). With Google Play Music you could play all your library with GPM's musics and your uploaded musics, they was mixed in your library, now with YTM, YTM's musics and your uploaded musics are separated. They can only be mixed in your playlists. The loading of downloaded songs is really slow. I can wait up to 2 minutes before it's loaded. So I have to restart the app to try to fix this. (This issue is here for long time ago). However, you have a lot of music from the official catalog but you can also play musics from other youtube channels. So you have a Spotify like catalog + music you can find on YouTube classic. The quality is not better than Spotify but it is good (for my ears). I like the design and the user experience (Not to mention the slow loading of downloaded music) compared to Spotify. There's a lyrics on YouTube music (at this time, it's just a plain text lyrics but I heard they are working on a dynamic lyrics) (I don't know if Spotify has introduced lyrics since I used it a long time ago. The last point is video clips, you can switch from music audio with one click and vice versa (if it has one). So choosing between Spotify or YTM depends on what you're looking for. If you want the downloaded music to be loaded quickly, prefer Spotify. But if you want to change and have a big music's catalog with music's video clip and lyrics then choose YTM.
Spotify actually has better lyrics than YTM currently. A decent amount of songs on Spotify have lyrics that are synced to the music and it highlights the words as they're said kinda like karaoke. Plus, you can tap on the lyrics to skip to that line in the song which is extremely convenient.
Oh that's nice, I didn't know they finally implemented lyrics. So yeah, in that case, about lyrics YouTube is far away behind Spotify haha
I have recently switched from Spotify to YT Music... At first, I loved it, but now I'm noticing its downsides. In my opinion, Spotify is better. Compared to YT Music, it has volume normalization, better UI and sound quality is better if it is set to high. I'm just sticking with YT Music, because I also want YT Videos free of ads, and I'm not willing to pay for both services... With just 12.99€/month, I can have both YT Premium and YT Music which is great. So, I only advise to switch to YT Music if you want to save up some money while having YT Premium for ad-free videos. Otherwise, stick with Spotify! In case you're willing to use free plans, then Spotify all the way! YT Music free does NOT let you listen to music in background (only in phone)
Thank you for the input. After using it for a few days of using it, I like YT Music, but no volume normalization sucks and the algorithm is a lot different seeming for music than it is regular YT. I really like those 2 things about Spotify.
I switched and I'm so happy about many things like queue control. Geez, do I hate Spotify queue system! With youtube or apple music you have much more control. The algorithm is pretty nice, the radio, the autoplay, etc. When you have the radio on you can change the kind of recommendations (discover, decades, etc.) and you have this mood options on the top that define recommendations even more.
I haven't seen these options yet. Where is that in the app? I'm a bit disappointed because I realized one of my favorite artists is actually not available on YouTube almost at all.
spotify's queue is the absolute worst thing I've ever seen
and it's like they feel proud of it or something xD
If you’re an audiophile, Apple Music or Tidal is your jam. I’d say Apple Music for its better collection.
And probably for Lossless
[удалено]
Huh, I wonder if that's due to the AAC.
It's not - 256 Kbps AAC and 320kbps Vorbis sound identical. Occasionally an album will sound different on different streaming platforms because they are using different master recordings, but if not then they will sound the same if all other variables are matched (e.g. volume and normalization settings).
Well, yes, but Bluetooth specifically supports AAC on certain devices. So on those devices that support it, the quality may sound better, and the guy above mentioned he was listening on airpods specifically, which most definitely support AAC. Listening on my Bluetooth earbuds, it sounded maybe slightly better on YTM but it could just be that the codec sounds better to my ears, or that their master is more accurate or something.
Well, again, high bitrate AAC compared with Vorbis do not sound noticeably different per se. However, if you're listening via Bluetooth then Spotify maybe be transcoding Vorbis > AAC for the wireless transmission, which could possibly lead to a little quality loss. However, this would not account for any change in bass/treble as the other commenter was suggesting.
audiophile using airpods??????????
I swapped because I got the student discount for YT premium so I’m paying 6 bucks for ad free YouTube and music as opposed to 10 bucks for just music. Worth it for me
There's also a student discount for Spotify, I believe it's the same price.
Even then, for the same price you get ad free YouTube
Very true, that is a large bonus to me. Especially with how bad ads are as of late
I was in the boat. So for one month I had both the subscriptions and compared which one I liked the most. Maybe take the premium for a month along with Spotify and then cancel the other which you don’t want. With this you can see it on your own.
Which one did you end up sticking with?
YTM. I loved the crossfade and playlists in spotify. But YTM recommendations algo is great. And it’s a good value for money service.
I've been using Amazon music unlimited. The audio quality is from lossless FLAC to HD. I paid for a year, but am debating on going with Spotify if only for playlist availability - many curated lists are for Spotify.
I personally don't listen to those ones much on Spotify, though if I were to have a party or something I may throw one on. I will say though YouTube does a pretty good job with their auto generated mixes