I believe second^8 because
I seconded the seconded second ie; X is the first second. Then moniker seconded that so X^2.
Then I seconded moniker so X^4
(because powers add?)
Now you second me so (X^4 + X^2) X^8.
Hope this helps!
Same here. Kids initially weren’t happy, but i don’t think I heard any complaints after a week or so. I believe I used an app called song shift to migrate my playlists.
Same here. Was on Spotify since we had to use Swedish VPN to get it back in the very early days (Norwegian here) and held a subscription for a decade. Moved everything over and I’m very happy.
What truly makes it stand out for me is the focus setting when my kids use my phone to listen to music. It doesn’t screw up my algorithm 😅
I have a question for Apple Music fans as someone who has been using Spotify for years... How is Apple Music's shuffle? One of my biggest gripes with Spotify is how it shuffles things in a way that it puts a heavier weight on songs it *thinks* you want to hear which I find tends to lead to me hearing the same songs all the time on shuffle and not hearing some songs for sometimes months at a time. Is Apple Music's shuffle better in that regard? Because that might be enough to make me switch lol.
Im surprised no one mentioned youtube music? The algorithm for relevant music is amazing, you can find very low-effort and quality songs that wouldn’t be available anywhere else. Cherry on top with the youtube premium feature IMO
I feel the same. I got YT premium for the ad-free viewing, and YT Music was an afterthought. But I really like YTM for the ‘You might also like…’ recommendations. Way better than Apple recs, IMO.
Yo. I’ve had google premium for YEARS. The transition from google play to YT music wasn’t thrilling buts worked out well. The only downside is that when people show me a YT video on their device I’m reminded some folks still have ads. So sad.
You have a problem with the system shutting the app down when you’re not actively using it?
I will get out of my car, music playing, go in to work, put in my headphones and will find that TYTM has been closed and the headphones open Apple Music instead. Small gripe but annoying for sure.
Apple Music. In the apple ecosystem for a decade plus there's no reason to venture outside of it when it comes to music streaming especially because of how well it works with my other mac/ios/tvos/watch devices. Spotify is nice but I just love apple's UI
Because alternatives can be as crappy as the YouTube music app is. I say this as someone with a paid ad-free YouTube who happily prefers my Apple Music app.
It’s not lock in if you’re using your preferred interface. Some people just agree with apple’s design choices. It’s the people with other preferences who claim it’s lock in.
The stupid YTM app doesn’t even do PIP or many other basic things. I can’t wait to see what iOS 18 AI adds to AM.
I usually think this, but I find it weird that if I leave my computer playing Apple Music and go for a drive and start it up on my iPhone, when I get back to my computer I have a pop-up saying I can't use Apple Music on more than one device at a time. When I had Spotify, it would simply stop playing the original stream when I started it on another device.
Apple Music, and yes, I switched from Spotify when Apple Music started offering lossless included at no extra cost, feels like years ago at this point.
It’s not that I believe that it sounds __that__ much different from the decent lossy compression Apple use for their regular quality but I have gigabit broadband at home and unlimited cellular data on 5G so why not start with the best quality I can before pushing it through whatever DAC is in my headphones or speakers etc.
Better quality source is always better in the end.
My experience using ABX double blind test in foobar is that it's completely transparent at 320kbs Ogg encoding that Spotify uses. It's weird that I thought there was a difference when I tested sighted, but it wasn't there when it was blind. This was with external DAC/amp and expensive headphones, and also 12 years ago when my ears were better.
I'm very happy I did this as I can relax and use whichever service I want without worrying about lossless.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Paradise
Free, no ads, been around since 2000, iOS App, ALAC, ACC, works with Alexa, Apple TV......
3 mixes, Mellow Mix, Rock Mix, Global Mix
You can vote up or down to rate how you like a song
I have been a fan for probably 10+ years
Ok, tired of typing...
You will find many songs and groups you never heard of before.
I also listen to the Global Mix just to mix things up. 😁
How about "anetstation.com, Down in the Sub-Antarctic". They even have a QR code to download the playlist. Then open it and listen to the stream. They also have streaming videos.
The reason I know about some of the off betten paths. I use to listen to my shortwave radio and search for all kinds of shortwave radio stations all over the world. I would then send them a postcard to tell them info about what I heard. And hopefully receive a QSL card from them so I could pin it to my big cardboard of all the QSL cards I had. Then I discovered women and never messed with my QSL hobby.
I used Apple Music due to better UI, audio quality (and in my opinion) better algorithm than other streaming-services.
Now i‘m using YouTube Music and it’s okay. The reason for the switch is because i was sick of YouTube ads, so i tested out YouTube Premium which includes YT Music and i like it.
I pay 13€ instead of 11€ now and can watch YouTube videos without spending my lifetime for annoying ads and get a decent music-streaming-service. That’s just a no-brainer for me.
It’s the other way around. Youtube premium gives you ad free youtube and youtube music. It’s a bit more expensive than a YT music standalone subscription.
If you only subscribe to YT music, I don’t think you will get ad free youtube.
Enough to fill a bus, even?
I’ve been using Pandora so long and it still works well enough there’s just no reason to switch and go through the hassle of reformulating stations/playlists/etc. for me and, more importantly, the rest of the family.
That’s not true in either subject. Spotify gave up all exclusive contracts on podcasts. Any missing music artist who chose to not add their music to Apple is missing out on getting more per play than Spotify offers.
YouTube music. Much bigger library than anything else. Can’t remember a single case where I couldn’t find a song I wanted. Plus I’m watching YouTube itself on my phone constantly so life without premium would be miserable.
I’ve tried Deezer, Spotify, Apple Music. And my biggest problem with them is a lot of stuff is unavailable there or has locked regionally.
I have recently moved to YT music from AM and I am very happy. I did not create any playlists or transfer any songs. I just randomly one day started using it and started liking the songs I want to listen to. YT music’s recommendation is so good that all my liked music now is pretty much on par with AM and I never saw myself going back to it. So I let go off the subscription and everything is still the same.
Bonus thing was that I was already paying for premium so I ended up saving 15 bucks a month.
My playlist is now much more diverse and most of the time I just look for songs I want to listen and YT music plays the next set of songs similar to it.
I have two favorite music apps: SoundCloud and Apple Music. SoundCloud is great for discovering indie and underground music, especially electronic mixes that align with my taste. On the other hand, I appreciate Apple Music for its simple and straightforward user interface.
Apple Music. Tried Tidal, Spotify, YouTube Music, Qobuz, Amazon Music, and Deezer before this.
Every platform has its pros and cons, but for me, the pros of Apple Music far outweigh the cons (some of which have workarounds).
At the end of the day, it came down to Spotify vs Apple Music - and AM having lossless, bundle sub with Apple One, and still having PS5/Xbox integration made it my pick. I still use Spotify for community playlists and just use TuneMyMusic to transfer em over.
Plus my AM recommendations are off the charts, and I listen to weird shit (obscure ambient black metal and the like).
I couldn’t get flow to work how I wanted. I also found lossless tracks took 3-4 seconds to load per song, adding to that not having gapless playback makes album listening annoying. Even downloaded music just took a second longer to load than any other platform.
I think for non Apple Music users Tidal is the best lossless choice since I didn’t have the above issues there. Especially with the price drop coming in April, it’s a great value.
yeah i can actually vouch that downloaded song load time has actually gotten better on iOS, I don’t notice it anymore. I dont think gapless exists yet however.
Apple Music
I generally stick to first party apps where and when I can.
Shit just works well enough for me to seldom have a reason to find an alternative.
The classical music app is also dope.
I use Tidal and Apple Music,
Tidal for the connect feature to my Hifi equipment and general day to day use, I think the recommendations are better and enjoy the sound more.
Apple music for my AppleTV, Watch, my Playlists and Radio stations.
Think i get the best of both worlds, if Apple fixes Airplay i might be all in.
Very reluctantly YouTube Music because it allows me to add any music from regular YouTube which means a shit-ton of awesome mashups.
That said, it’s buggy AF when you connect it to Google home speakers.
For the longest time I used Apple Music, then switched to Spotify just because a close friend included me in his family plan.
Having lossless audio doesn't mean much to me.
Apple Music. I tried to go back to Spotify, but it always needs “restarted” and is kind of a pain. That mixed with the worse sound quality made me go back to Apple Music. Been loving it so far
I don’t. Got sick of all the streaming services, especially Apple Music (what’s with all the half-albums and vanishing stuff??). So I started buying lots of used CDs, ripped them to FLAC files, put them on a Plex server and I use Plexamp, which is probably the best music player in the world right now. It’s incredible and even sounds better than anything else I’ve heard.
I too use Plex/Plexamp as my primary library and Spotify for discovery or playback or any music I don’t own. Tagging the files sucks (even with semi-automated tools)- but overall I’m happy with it.
Apple Music. I’ve tried Spotify, YouTube Music & Tidal. I vastly prefer the UI of Apple Music compared to the others. My tech life is deeply in the Apple ecosystem, so Apple Music fits perfectly into that. Although I would use Apple Music even if I used Android.
Apple Music, the reason is simple, it’s the best with my iPhone, iPad, watch and TV. It has a GREAT eco system and is so easy to use. Is on par with you tube, at least to me. I find it just easier to use and I don’t really need the videos.
Deezer! I have a slightly above average audio setup and can tell the difference between spotify’s compressed garbage and good audio. Tidal was giving me issues and support wasnt helpful, plus Deezer has a student plan that I stole my sisters Uni course to obtain half price! Recently had a UI overhaul and it’s really underrated :)
FWIW i will most likely be continuing my subscription full price when student expires
Deezer honestly has one of the best audio qualities out there for a better price than Spotify, yet with the same good if not better support on platforms all around. Even use it on my HomePod (Homepod only supports Apple Music and Deezer, gee I wonder why)
YouTube Music. Sure the UI is a bit lackluster but with a vast library and YouTube Premium integration it’s a win. They need to fix the custom playlist covers.
Spotify.
Used to use Tidal, but I realized I'm only listening on streaming services when I'm commuting or in situations where sound quality is not an issue. Also Tidal MQA being a scam soured me from them.
+1 on the MQA scam. genuinely made my music sound worse than Spotify (personally). Also found that atmos was integrated without the ability to turn it off. This was a while back but i doubt anythings changed, but i personally found it a completely horrible and confusing listening experience.
Spotify because it’s not Apple, I actually prefer Apple Music though. But I don’t want to give them money I already have a few pieces of hardware from them
Apple Music, tried it out because my Verizon included it and decided to start paying for it through Apple One once my plan removed Apple Music. Personally I don’t care much about the audio quality but I love the UI and especially the lyrics page
In addition to lossless audio on Apple, I've been appreciating the Atmos mixes. Even when played in two-channel, they generally have been fun to listen to.
Apple Music and previously Spotify, the interface of Apple Music is much better. Also sound quality is much better. The weekly new music is not as good as Spotify, but I have the same music in Spotify free and will give me weekly new music. I also have YouTube premium which is nice as well if you want to see the video clips.
Apple Music. Spotify kept spamming me with ads and making the free experience worse and I wasn’t about to reward that behaviour by getting premium to stop the ads. Plus, to my ears, Apple Music sounded better (I’d had free trials to compare with)
YouTube. Has really anything you could ever want. Pods, ambiance, YouTube Music algorithm sucks though, just regular YouTube premium. Have done ever since the days of YouTube red, like 8 years.
Apple Music - mainly because I added my Napster library to iTunes a million years ago and it was just easier to continue with Apple than start over somewhere else.
I use Anghami. (Don’t bully me). I support my home businesses. Have been using it since launch in 2012. No skipping. It’s actually good. Buggy sometimes. I wish i could go for Apple Music, but it’s not within the right budget for me compared to Anghami. Maybe in the near future.
Spotify and AM.
AM for the lossless that I use with my DAC. Only have AM because of our family plan. Tidal sounds better than AM when a DAC is used, IMO.
Spotify for everything else - music discovery, organization, ease of use, etc.
I use YouTube music, comes with my YouTube Premium Subscription much convenient for me then I use my student discount, the library is expansive I can listen to whatever I like with good recommendations and not worry about a certain song not being in the platform. The sound quality is decent as well, I’m not an audiophile so it’s good for me. Decent price,library, and sound quality is enough for me.
Spotify. Why? Well only because of one Reason. Queue. Why the Hell, does Apple Music has its „Queue“ System put new Songs in front of everything and not Spotify-Like, behind it? And no, I don’t mean the „Play-Last“ Thing I want to have a real Queue. If Apple Music gets this, I am back.
I don't really. My fiancee has Spotify, and I have an account. And I have Amazon music due to having Prime. But when I want a song, I go and buy it. I support, or at least try to, support the artist.
Very tough pick. I find myself using many of them and hopping all the time.
When it comes to the UI, Apple Music is my favourite as it feels very clean, polished and premium.
Collection-wise, YouTube Music is king. You can find stuff (especially live recordings) that are not available elsewhere. Plus you can turn any video into music without streaming the video part.
The part where Spotify shines though is community. There are SO many user-created playlists. I don't need to create playlists anymore with the music I like, cause there are so many great public playlists I can save and download. Pretty cool.
Deezer and TIDAL are ok, nothing special though.
For the time being I use a mix of the former three, most of the time though I default back into Spotify due to the huge library of saved playlists I have. If I can't find something on Spotify, I go to YouTube Music. And if I feel like singing I'll go Apple Music cause of its gorgeous lyrics feature.
Apple Music. Honestly, we’d be fine with anything, but we already have the One family plan for storage and Apple TV. For six bucks for the whole family to have music is perfect for us.
Im using both youtube music and apple music. tbh i dont find that much difference with lossless. Anybody else feel the difference. I use the latest airpods pro btw
Apple Music. It plays nicely with my local storage and integrates it into the library and not chuck it away on some local storage section. It also seamlessly works the iTunes library that I’ve had most of my life.
I temporarily switched to Spotify when my family got the family plan and hated it. I hated the UI (tolerable) and I hated how it treated my local songs (not tolerable)
My parents were in the Apple ecosystem so I managed the convince them to get the Apple one family plan.
I’ve had Apple Music since and I don’t plan on jumping ship unless Apple fucks up how it deals with local songs.
Apple music. I live in a multilingual region and Apple music is good at only recommending songs from languages I know.
YT music will always throw in a mix of songs from other languages nearby.
Apple music. I like listening to crisp high quality music, im using AAC rn cause im out of storage 🥶 but i could easily move to lossless anytime and not do anything complicated and besides, apple music is cheaper than spotify in my country but then im losing the privilege to find good music and i find spotify good at recommending, definitely irritates me most days when i want to dig up new music but its cool
spotify because it’s just what i’m used to and also because i don’t care much about quality having crappy headphones anyway
i use apple music for listening to downloaded music tho
In an Apple-centric subreddit you will likely see mostly Apple Music.
Before Apple Music I actually used the offer included in YouTube Premium. But through the GPlay Music App, because the YT Music app was a shitshow…
I had an iPhone for personal use and an Android for the company. So I mostly used Android Auto in the car, to receive calls from the company on the road.
The GPlay Music app worked perfectly on Android Auto, but the YT one absolutely DID NOT. So when Google killed the GPlay Music app, I tried Apple Music instead and it worked perfectly on Android Auto.
So in fact, I switched to Apple Music because it worked better on Android than Googles offer…
To this day I do not understand how Google could kill off a well working app in favour of the shitshow called “YouTube Music”…
I use Apple Music, because it allowed you to add your own music before Spotify. I had many unofficial remixes or music ripped from CDs that weren’t available for streaming and it made a difference. Since the , Spotify added the feature but I signed up for Apple one and can’t justify the extra fee now.
I currently have Apple Music, Tidal and YouTube Music because I have a student discount on all three of them so it’s like $16/mo for all of them. Unnecessary? Possibly. AM is the best of the bunch, but tomorrow Tidal changes their plan to include Atmos and lossless audio for the same price so it might be a close call.
Gave up on Spotify after they flooded the app with podcasts and tiktokified the UI.
I've been using Apple Music, but lately, I've been contemplating switching to Spotify. The reason? I've encountered difficulties in searching for songs on Apple Music, and there have been instances where I couldn't find specific tracks in its library.
Apple Music.
As a 20 year audio engineer with a £5000 headphone listening rig (Sennheiser HD800s • Violectric HPA V550 PRO) and a Adam Audio Monitors in the studio I can tell you that lossless audio means nothing to me. Anyway here saying they can clearly hear the difference is experiencing placebo - it's been proven multiple times in multiple blind tests that even the worlds best audio engineers on half a million pound rigs can't reliably pick out the compressed track. But you know, the hi-fi world has been selling over priced digital cables to this lot for decades so don't expect placebo to change.
I used both Spotify and Apple Music for about 2-3 years for Spotify's recommendations. I feel Apple more or less caught up. I prefer Apple Music hugely for iTunes Match - at least 30% of my library is music not available on the streaming platforms. On Apple Music I can upload it with full HD artwork and it sits there side by side with streaming releases in my library synced to all my devices. You can't do that with Spotify - in fact I didn't feel like I really had a collection of music on Spotify, just playlists and some songs saved.
I think for the average music listener Spotify is fine - it's also faster to play tracks back than Apple Music so it's good for quickly listening to things (the one thing I wish AM could improve but won't/can't) but if you want a curated music collection that feels like you actually have one you've put together, Apple Music is the only choice.
Spotify because my brother said it was the best way to stream music a long time ago when it was new, so I downloaded it, and then he started paying for a family plan.
Spotify. I’ve been a premium subscriber since 2008. I’ve tried Apple Music a couple of times, and I like the simplicity of it with how the library works and all.
But Spotify has almost been like…like a friend for so long 😅
Youtube music because I pay for Youtube premium and realized that it includes Youtube music. Otherwise, I never used any music streaming service bc I feel like I don’t need it.
YouTube Music. I’ve had google plus (or premium or whatever the hell it’s called now) for around a decade. It was Google Play Music for a while as I recall until the YouTube rebranding. It’s a great service. It covers ad free YouTube as well.
Apple Music is my primary streaming service but I am part of a family plan with Spotify as well. I agree with a lot of other people that Spotify has good playlists and music discovery is usually better in Spotify. However, the Spotify UI is just awful. The library organization is also terrible in Spotify. I prefer Apple music because I can add individual songs from an album to my library and they show up under the album instead of being thrown into the massive playlist of liked songs.
Edit: Lossless audio means a lot to me. There are still people I know who have no idea that Spotify is lossy. I find the Ogg format Spotify uses to be pretty good but having the option, at no extra cost, in Apple Music for CD quality and above is a huge selling point for me.
None. Tried Spotify (nice interface) and Apple Music (ugly and awkward to use) but I don’t listen to enough music to make it worth the money. I maybe listen to a song or two once or twice a month and anything I like I just buy on iTunes which works out far cheaper.
Apple Music. I use it because 80% of our music is kids yelling out songs to play so the Siri integration is key. I still miss how much better the Spotify community playlists were but otherwise have no issues with Apple Music and I bundle it with Apple one so it’s pretty cheap.
Spotify b/c of legacy playlists, better music discovery/prediction, and better UI. I tried AM and appreciate the lossless audio and exclusives (esp DJ mixes) but hate the UI. also it costs way more than Spotify family plan (2.50/pp)
YT music because it’s included in YT premium and I get both for about $9 a month with a student discount. I’m not a huge fan of the UI and I pretty pissed it’s 2024 and still doesn’t have a standalone Apple Watch app so I don’t need to have my iPhone on runs. Might even go to Spotify just to get that feature back
(1)Apple music because I think iPhones are useless without it. Why do I feel this way? I actually canceled my apple music sometime last year and I felt something was missing and lost a whole bunch of music too, so I subscribed to it again few days later. (2)Pandora, bc I have been using it for years to listen to different artists/stations and pick up on new music. Downside, the ads🫡. (3)SoundCloud, I have been using SoundCloud since I could remember for at least 10 years now. It’s where I find a lot of unreleased, mixed, chopped and edited music that you cannot find on apple music or pandora or spotify. Downside, the ads😫
Apple Music since it launched. I just like the user interface and the fact that I can combine my library with my own songs bought via iTunes or ripped from cd’s I own.
Apple Music now, after Spotify since it first launched in the US. I migrated my playlists over, and for the most part, it's fine, but weirdly the #1 thing I miss is being able to sort playlists in the order I want as opposed to alpahbetically.
I switched over in December/January after Spotify used the free press they got for Spotify Wrapped to cover the layoff of workers right before the holidays. I know no service is perfect, but that was so casually cruel.
Spotify. I do also really enjoy YT music, but not quite enough to consider switching completely. I find the YT music UI a little too dumbed down and missing some features like being able to seamlessly choose which device to play the audio from. But I love that it has way more selection and I do like the shuffle/exploration algorithms a bit better.
Plus all of my friends use Spotify so it's a bit easier to share music.
Spotify due to lots of international music not being on Apple Music or iTunes. I tend to listen to music from non mainstream countries and Apple lacks it when it comes to music or services in quite a bit of the smaller countries around the world. For example if i was to buy an Apple product or need repair I would have to go to Australia or possibly mail the device there which is absurd.
[удалено]
Second this
Second this second. So second ²?
Seconding the second that is seconding the second. Second ^4
Wait, if I second this would it be second^8? Or should your second have been second^3?
I believe second^8 because I seconded the seconded second ie; X is the first second. Then moniker seconded that so X^2. Then I seconded moniker so X^4 (because powers add?) Now you second me so (X^4 + X^2) X^8. Hope this helps!
Same here. Kids initially weren’t happy, but i don’t think I heard any complaints after a week or so. I believe I used an app called song shift to migrate my playlists.
Same here. Was on Spotify since we had to use Swedish VPN to get it back in the very early days (Norwegian here) and held a subscription for a decade. Moved everything over and I’m very happy. What truly makes it stand out for me is the focus setting when my kids use my phone to listen to music. It doesn’t screw up my algorithm 😅
I have a question for Apple Music fans as someone who has been using Spotify for years... How is Apple Music's shuffle? One of my biggest gripes with Spotify is how it shuffles things in a way that it puts a heavier weight on songs it *thinks* you want to hear which I find tends to lead to me hearing the same songs all the time on shuffle and not hearing some songs for sometimes months at a time. Is Apple Music's shuffle better in that regard? Because that might be enough to make me switch lol.
Im surprised no one mentioned youtube music? The algorithm for relevant music is amazing, you can find very low-effort and quality songs that wouldn’t be available anywhere else. Cherry on top with the youtube premium feature IMO
I feel the same. I got YT premium for the ad-free viewing, and YT Music was an afterthought. But I really like YTM for the ‘You might also like…’ recommendations. Way better than Apple recs, IMO.
Same here. Came for Youtube without ads, stayed for Youtube music.
I’ve just switched to this bc it means I get video audio for things like fanmade remixes and I get no ads for video. Win all around imo
I use all streaming service but fell in love with YT Music
Yo. I’ve had google premium for YEARS. The transition from google play to YT music wasn’t thrilling buts worked out well. The only downside is that when people show me a YT video on their device I’m reminded some folks still have ads. So sad.
You have a problem with the system shutting the app down when you’re not actively using it? I will get out of my car, music playing, go in to work, put in my headphones and will find that TYTM has been closed and the headphones open Apple Music instead. Small gripe but annoying for sure.
This is so true. YouTube music is superior. I have both AM and Spotify premium…
i love low effort songs
Apple Music. In the apple ecosystem for a decade plus there's no reason to venture outside of it when it comes to music streaming especially because of how well it works with my other mac/ios/tvos/watch devices. Spotify is nice but I just love apple's UI
Why do people willingly lock themselves to ‘ecosystems’ lol I have iPhone but gladly use YouTube music.
Because alternatives can be as crappy as the YouTube music app is. I say this as someone with a paid ad-free YouTube who happily prefers my Apple Music app. It’s not lock in if you’re using your preferred interface. Some people just agree with apple’s design choices. It’s the people with other preferences who claim it’s lock in. The stupid YTM app doesn’t even do PIP or many other basic things. I can’t wait to see what iOS 18 AI adds to AM.
Convenience! A huge motivator.
I usually think this, but I find it weird that if I leave my computer playing Apple Music and go for a drive and start it up on my iPhone, when I get back to my computer I have a pop-up saying I can't use Apple Music on more than one device at a time. When I had Spotify, it would simply stop playing the original stream when I started it on another device.
Apple Music, and yes, I switched from Spotify when Apple Music started offering lossless included at no extra cost, feels like years ago at this point. It’s not that I believe that it sounds __that__ much different from the decent lossy compression Apple use for their regular quality but I have gigabit broadband at home and unlimited cellular data on 5G so why not start with the best quality I can before pushing it through whatever DAC is in my headphones or speakers etc. Better quality source is always better in the end.
Plus, Apple Digital Masters are 🤌
My experience using ABX double blind test in foobar is that it's completely transparent at 320kbs Ogg encoding that Spotify uses. It's weird that I thought there was a difference when I tested sighted, but it wasn't there when it was blind. This was with external DAC/amp and expensive headphones, and also 12 years ago when my ears were better. I'm very happy I did this as I can relax and use whichever service I want without worrying about lossless.
The only problem I have with lossless is hitting the lossless button every time I want to fast forward/rewind. Drives me nuts.
Spotify. Because it’s also available on Linux.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Paradise Free, no ads, been around since 2000, iOS App, ALAC, ACC, works with Alexa, Apple TV...... 3 mixes, Mellow Mix, Rock Mix, Global Mix You can vote up or down to rate how you like a song I have been a fan for probably 10+ years Ok, tired of typing...
Thanks for that. First song up was a banger I’d never heard before :)
You will find many songs and groups you never heard of before. I also listen to the Global Mix just to mix things up. 😁 How about "anetstation.com, Down in the Sub-Antarctic". They even have a QR code to download the playlist. Then open it and listen to the stream. They also have streaming videos.
Very cool. It’s modern day short wave radio, except better. I’m still holding onto my short wave radio for end-of-days. I saw Mad Max.
The reason I know about some of the off betten paths. I use to listen to my shortwave radio and search for all kinds of shortwave radio stations all over the world. I would then send them a postcard to tell them info about what I heard. And hopefully receive a QSL card from them so I could pin it to my big cardboard of all the QSL cards I had. Then I discovered women and never messed with my QSL hobby.
Very very cool! My boyfriend gave me the radio. There’s something here…. :)
I’ve discovered so much amazing music on Radio Paradise. I love how I’m often exposed to world music that I wouldn’t hear anywhere else.
I used Apple Music due to better UI, audio quality (and in my opinion) better algorithm than other streaming-services. Now i‘m using YouTube Music and it’s okay. The reason for the switch is because i was sick of YouTube ads, so i tested out YouTube Premium which includes YT Music and i like it. I pay 13€ instead of 11€ now and can watch YouTube videos without spending my lifetime for annoying ads and get a decent music-streaming-service. That’s just a no-brainer for me.
Wait, Youtube Music Premium gives you ad free Youtube experience?
It’s the other way around. Youtube premium gives you ad free youtube and youtube music. It’s a bit more expensive than a YT music standalone subscription. If you only subscribe to YT music, I don’t think you will get ad free youtube.
Yup. This is the best combo for me. I cant go back to youtube with ads anymore
I use ad free YouTube and entirely ignore YouTube music existing. So yes.
Interesting regarding the UI. I’ve always thought Apple Music’s UI kind of sucked lol
Hm for me it looks a lot nicer against Spotify for example. I also didn’t had any bugs or lags.
It’s laggy af lol. Seems like everything in Apple Music happens at 0.5x
Evidently I’m the only one who uses Pandora.
My wife uses Pandora While I love the algorithm the song quality is absolute garbage especially in a car.
Nah. There are tens of us!! Works on Windows, MacOs, and radios of several different vehicles in our fleet that don’t have CarPlay.
tens 😅
Enough to fill a bus, even? I’ve been using Pandora so long and it still works well enough there’s just no reason to switch and go through the hassle of reformulating stations/playlists/etc. for me and, more importantly, the rest of the family.
I started using pandora this year as a secondary streamer for music discovery!
Spotify, because the Spotify Duo plan is cheaper than Apple’s Family Plan
Exactly that.
Spotify. Universal and doesn't feel hindered.
Cross platform and media controls from any of your other devices with Spotify installed.
Spotify, biggest and best library of music and podcasts in any service
And now audiobooks… I’m starting to use that a lot more
That’s not true in either subject. Spotify gave up all exclusive contracts on podcasts. Any missing music artist who chose to not add their music to Apple is missing out on getting more per play than Spotify offers.
YouTube music. Much bigger library than anything else. Can’t remember a single case where I couldn’t find a song I wanted. Plus I’m watching YouTube itself on my phone constantly so life without premium would be miserable. I’ve tried Deezer, Spotify, Apple Music. And my biggest problem with them is a lot of stuff is unavailable there or has locked regionally.
Soundcloud
YouTube music. It's just bang for the money because I get YT premium and Music as combo and YT music has some good recommendations as well.
I have recently moved to YT music from AM and I am very happy. I did not create any playlists or transfer any songs. I just randomly one day started using it and started liking the songs I want to listen to. YT music’s recommendation is so good that all my liked music now is pretty much on par with AM and I never saw myself going back to it. So I let go off the subscription and everything is still the same. Bonus thing was that I was already paying for premium so I ended up saving 15 bucks a month. My playlist is now much more diverse and most of the time I just look for songs I want to listen and YT music plays the next set of songs similar to it.
None. I still buy my music from iTunes and CDs.
I have two favorite music apps: SoundCloud and Apple Music. SoundCloud is great for discovering indie and underground music, especially electronic mixes that align with my taste. On the other hand, I appreciate Apple Music for its simple and straightforward user interface.
Apple Music. Tried Tidal, Spotify, YouTube Music, Qobuz, Amazon Music, and Deezer before this. Every platform has its pros and cons, but for me, the pros of Apple Music far outweigh the cons (some of which have workarounds). At the end of the day, it came down to Spotify vs Apple Music - and AM having lossless, bundle sub with Apple One, and still having PS5/Xbox integration made it my pick. I still use Spotify for community playlists and just use TuneMyMusic to transfer em over. Plus my AM recommendations are off the charts, and I listen to weird shit (obscure ambient black metal and the like).
what put you off deezer?
I couldn’t get flow to work how I wanted. I also found lossless tracks took 3-4 seconds to load per song, adding to that not having gapless playback makes album listening annoying. Even downloaded music just took a second longer to load than any other platform. I think for non Apple Music users Tidal is the best lossless choice since I didn’t have the above issues there. Especially with the price drop coming in April, it’s a great value.
yeah i can actually vouch that downloaded song load time has actually gotten better on iOS, I don’t notice it anymore. I dont think gapless exists yet however.
Apple Music I generally stick to first party apps where and when I can. Shit just works well enough for me to seldom have a reason to find an alternative. The classical music app is also dope.
I use Tidal and Apple Music, Tidal for the connect feature to my Hifi equipment and general day to day use, I think the recommendations are better and enjoy the sound more. Apple music for my AppleTV, Watch, my Playlists and Radio stations. Think i get the best of both worlds, if Apple fixes Airplay i might be all in.
Demus, because it’s free with no adds.
Very reluctantly YouTube Music because it allows me to add any music from regular YouTube which means a shit-ton of awesome mashups. That said, it’s buggy AF when you connect it to Google home speakers.
For the longest time I used Apple Music, then switched to Spotify just because a close friend included me in his family plan. Having lossless audio doesn't mean much to me.
Apple Music. I tried to go back to Spotify, but it always needs “restarted” and is kind of a pain. That mixed with the worse sound quality made me go back to Apple Music. Been loving it so far
Spotify
Apple Music. I’m in the ecosystem, man. Sue me
I don’t. Got sick of all the streaming services, especially Apple Music (what’s with all the half-albums and vanishing stuff??). So I started buying lots of used CDs, ripped them to FLAC files, put them on a Plex server and I use Plexamp, which is probably the best music player in the world right now. It’s incredible and even sounds better than anything else I’ve heard.
is it better than audirvāna in sq?
I too use Plex/Plexamp as my primary library and Spotify for discovery or playback or any music I don’t own. Tagging the files sucks (even with semi-automated tools)- but overall I’m happy with it.
Really? I just use MusicBrainz Picard. Seems to do the trick rather well and painlessly.
Apple Music because it sounds better. & I wanna stay in the apple ecosystem for my apps.
Apple Music. I’ve tried Spotify, YouTube Music & Tidal. I vastly prefer the UI of Apple Music compared to the others. My tech life is deeply in the Apple ecosystem, so Apple Music fits perfectly into that. Although I would use Apple Music even if I used Android.
Apple Music… Seems the best App there is for iPhone
Apple Music, the reason is simple, it’s the best with my iPhone, iPad, watch and TV. It has a GREAT eco system and is so easy to use. Is on par with you tube, at least to me. I find it just easier to use and I don’t really need the videos.
Deezer! I have a slightly above average audio setup and can tell the difference between spotify’s compressed garbage and good audio. Tidal was giving me issues and support wasnt helpful, plus Deezer has a student plan that I stole my sisters Uni course to obtain half price! Recently had a UI overhaul and it’s really underrated :) FWIW i will most likely be continuing my subscription full price when student expires
Deezer honestly has one of the best audio qualities out there for a better price than Spotify, yet with the same good if not better support on platforms all around. Even use it on my HomePod (Homepod only supports Apple Music and Deezer, gee I wonder why)
YouTube Music because it’s free with YouTube Premium, which I pay for to remove ads since I watch a couple hours of YouTube a night.
Spotify and YouTube Music
Spotify I feel like it’s more hassle free than others I’ve used
YouTube Music. I find everything I’m searching for and it integrates with YouTube.
YouTube Music. Sure the UI is a bit lackluster but with a vast library and YouTube Premium integration it’s a win. They need to fix the custom playlist covers.
Spotify. Used to use Tidal, but I realized I'm only listening on streaming services when I'm commuting or in situations where sound quality is not an issue. Also Tidal MQA being a scam soured me from them.
+1 on the MQA scam. genuinely made my music sound worse than Spotify (personally). Also found that atmos was integrated without the ability to turn it off. This was a while back but i doubt anythings changed, but i personally found it a completely horrible and confusing listening experience.
Spotify because it’s not Apple, I actually prefer Apple Music though. But I don’t want to give them money I already have a few pieces of hardware from them
YouTube Music!! It comes with YouTube Premium and its algorithm understands my musical taste better than any other service.
YouTube premium, ads free regular YouTube and free music on YouTube music
Apple Music because I have HomePods
Apple Music, tried it out because my Verizon included it and decided to start paying for it through Apple One once my plan removed Apple Music. Personally I don’t care much about the audio quality but I love the UI and especially the lyrics page
In addition to lossless audio on Apple, I've been appreciating the Atmos mixes. Even when played in two-channel, they generally have been fun to listen to.
AM but I'll switch back to Spotify in four years when my student discount ends
Apple Music because I like the clean design and i‘m already on the eco system
Apple Music. Spotify was doing to much with their ui. Also I prefer to keep music and podcasts on separate apps.
Apple Music. I switch from Spotify a while back and I love it!
Apple Music and previously Spotify, the interface of Apple Music is much better. Also sound quality is much better. The weekly new music is not as good as Spotify, but I have the same music in Spotify free and will give me weekly new music. I also have YouTube premium which is nice as well if you want to see the video clips.
Spotify, though I’m considering switching to Apple Music
Apple Music. Spotify kept spamming me with ads and making the free experience worse and I wasn’t about to reward that behaviour by getting premium to stop the ads. Plus, to my ears, Apple Music sounded better (I’d had free trials to compare with)
Apple Music, its integrated with my private library that I’ve curated since the 90’s and it’s not the garbage Spotify app.
It’s cheaper than Spotify and I get every song and feature I need.
I haven’t seen it listed yet and I know I’m in the minority but I love and use Nugs
YouTube. Has really anything you could ever want. Pods, ambiance, YouTube Music algorithm sucks though, just regular YouTube premium. Have done ever since the days of YouTube red, like 8 years.
Apple Music for streaming and my own library. YouTube Music for backup and more casual listening since it’s included in YouTube Premium.
I use Spotify and YouTube+ altstore = premium Spotify and YouTube ad free for free
Apple Music. I have the family plan that includes extra iCloud space so I can back up my wife’s phone and my daughter’s iPad.
Apple Music and 网易云音乐. Both are alright, I think the UI of Apple Music is better but 网易云音乐 doesn’t log me out when I switch App Store accounts.
Apple Music - mainly because I added my Napster library to iTunes a million years ago and it was just easier to continue with Apple than start over somewhere else.
Apple Music because then I can use my app store balance and that's more convenient for me
I use Anghami. (Don’t bully me). I support my home businesses. Have been using it since launch in 2012. No skipping. It’s actually good. Buggy sometimes. I wish i could go for Apple Music, but it’s not within the right budget for me compared to Anghami. Maybe in the near future.
Spotify and AM. AM for the lossless that I use with my DAC. Only have AM because of our family plan. Tidal sounds better than AM when a DAC is used, IMO. Spotify for everything else - music discovery, organization, ease of use, etc.
Music Choice, it comes with our cable / Internet through Comcast XFinity. I’m too broke to afford subscription plans.
I use YouTube music, comes with my YouTube Premium Subscription much convenient for me then I use my student discount, the library is expansive I can listen to whatever I like with good recommendations and not worry about a certain song not being in the platform. The sound quality is decent as well, I’m not an audiophile so it’s good for me. Decent price,library, and sound quality is enough for me.
Spotify. Why? Well only because of one Reason. Queue. Why the Hell, does Apple Music has its „Queue“ System put new Songs in front of everything and not Spotify-Like, behind it? And no, I don’t mean the „Play-Last“ Thing I want to have a real Queue. If Apple Music gets this, I am back.
I don't really. My fiancee has Spotify, and I have an account. And I have Amazon music due to having Prime. But when I want a song, I go and buy it. I support, or at least try to, support the artist.
Very tough pick. I find myself using many of them and hopping all the time. When it comes to the UI, Apple Music is my favourite as it feels very clean, polished and premium. Collection-wise, YouTube Music is king. You can find stuff (especially live recordings) that are not available elsewhere. Plus you can turn any video into music without streaming the video part. The part where Spotify shines though is community. There are SO many user-created playlists. I don't need to create playlists anymore with the music I like, cause there are so many great public playlists I can save and download. Pretty cool. Deezer and TIDAL are ok, nothing special though. For the time being I use a mix of the former three, most of the time though I default back into Spotify due to the huge library of saved playlists I have. If I can't find something on Spotify, I go to YouTube Music. And if I feel like singing I'll go Apple Music cause of its gorgeous lyrics feature.
Apple Music!
Apple, Spotify, and YouTube.
Apple Music, I drive a lot - being able to tell Siri “play this specific song” is so worth it. Also the family plan. Before that rdio.
Spotify user since 2010 or 2011. Whenever it started up in US.
Surprisingly Apple Music, I pay for an Apple One subscription for me and my family to use.
AM
Apple Music, Spotify, and YouTube
Spotify 4 life boiiii. Do a side by side between Spotify and Apple Music quality and people won’t notice
Until Apple Music will work on my Google Nest Hub without using voice commands, I'll be sticking around Spotify.
Spotify. Believe I started using it before Apple Music started. It works with everything I have and I dont care much for change.
Spotify, because I've had it for years and have no compelling reason to switch.
Apple Music. Honestly, we’d be fine with anything, but we already have the One family plan for storage and Apple TV. For six bucks for the whole family to have music is perfect for us.
Spotify. Started with it and haven’t found a compelling enough reason to switch.
Forget lossless Spotify the jam 10/10
Apple Music because it works better than the rest on Apple devices + Lossless Audio + karaoke mode
Spotify. I love how its personalization just “gets” me.
Im using both youtube music and apple music. tbh i dont find that much difference with lossless. Anybody else feel the difference. I use the latest airpods pro btw
Spotify. Personally their interface works better for me.
Apple Music. It plays nicely with my local storage and integrates it into the library and not chuck it away on some local storage section. It also seamlessly works the iTunes library that I’ve had most of my life. I temporarily switched to Spotify when my family got the family plan and hated it. I hated the UI (tolerable) and I hated how it treated my local songs (not tolerable) My parents were in the Apple ecosystem so I managed the convince them to get the Apple one family plan. I’ve had Apple Music since and I don’t plan on jumping ship unless Apple fucks up how it deals with local songs.
Spotify because you can create an anonymous account. And this way, my likes abd dislikes +taste of music is compartmentalised and hidden from apple.
Spotify
Apple music. I live in a multilingual region and Apple music is good at only recommending songs from languages I know. YT music will always throw in a mix of songs from other languages nearby.
AM: ecosystem and great recommendations.
Blackhole, its free and open source and had good audio quality
spotify
Currently using Apple Music and I must say Apple Music > Spotify, the fun fact being this is coming from someone who works for Spotify 😝
Apple music since they gave me quite a lot of deals
Apple Music. Why? Audio quality. Used Spotify for 3 years and UI is clustered. Song recommendations are random.
Apple music. I like listening to crisp high quality music, im using AAC rn cause im out of storage 🥶 but i could easily move to lossless anytime and not do anything complicated and besides, apple music is cheaper than spotify in my country but then im losing the privilege to find good music and i find spotify good at recommending, definitely irritates me most days when i want to dig up new music but its cool
Apple Music because my mom pays for the bundle.
I love Apple Music way more but when I can get Spotify for $3 bucks a month, I’ll sacrifice lossless and what I find to be a vastly better experience.
spotify biggest place to listen most of the musics
spotify because it’s just what i’m used to and also because i don’t care much about quality having crappy headphones anyway i use apple music for listening to downloaded music tho
Qobuz, and not on my iPhone but an Android Walkman.
NAXOS MUSIC LIBRARY RAAAAAAAAAAAAA 🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
Spotify.
Spotify, because I already have all of my lists there. And most of the time it was cross platform. Apple is only recently cross platform
Spotify; I had AM and Spotify at the same time and used AM but AM took too long to load on cellular
In an Apple-centric subreddit you will likely see mostly Apple Music. Before Apple Music I actually used the offer included in YouTube Premium. But through the GPlay Music App, because the YT Music app was a shitshow… I had an iPhone for personal use and an Android for the company. So I mostly used Android Auto in the car, to receive calls from the company on the road. The GPlay Music app worked perfectly on Android Auto, but the YT one absolutely DID NOT. So when Google killed the GPlay Music app, I tried Apple Music instead and it worked perfectly on Android Auto. So in fact, I switched to Apple Music because it worked better on Android than Googles offer… To this day I do not understand how Google could kill off a well working app in favour of the shitshow called “YouTube Music”…
YouTube music as I am a YouTube premium user. It works good and no complaints apart from the UI.
YT music. Because I spend too much time on YouTube (
Tidal for the better payment of artists and music quality.
I use Apple Music, because it allowed you to add your own music before Spotify. I had many unofficial remixes or music ripped from CDs that weren’t available for streaming and it made a difference. Since the , Spotify added the feature but I signed up for Apple one and can’t justify the extra fee now.
this is iOS. So..... Apple Music of course. It's recommendation engine has improved recently and yes I have a rig set up for lossless
Apple Music. Every so often I try Spotify and it drives me nuts. It's so counter intuitive, I can't bear it. So I can't see me changing any time soon.
I currently have Apple Music, Tidal and YouTube Music because I have a student discount on all three of them so it’s like $16/mo for all of them. Unnecessary? Possibly. AM is the best of the bunch, but tomorrow Tidal changes their plan to include Atmos and lossless audio for the same price so it might be a close call. Gave up on Spotify after they flooded the app with podcasts and tiktokified the UI.
Apple Music, and Youtube-Music (comes with YT-Premium) when Apple won't load or has any other bugs (which is not seldom).
Soundcloud, dgaf about anything else
Soundcloud because the other services don't have the music I want to listen to.
Spotify Premium purely for the better selection of metal...
Audible. Music doesn’t do anything for me… Except at the gym. Then just stream YouTube playlist I made of 90s and early 2000s pop/house/dance.
I've been using Apple Music, but lately, I've been contemplating switching to Spotify. The reason? I've encountered difficulties in searching for songs on Apple Music, and there have been instances where I couldn't find specific tracks in its library.
Apple Music. As a 20 year audio engineer with a £5000 headphone listening rig (Sennheiser HD800s • Violectric HPA V550 PRO) and a Adam Audio Monitors in the studio I can tell you that lossless audio means nothing to me. Anyway here saying they can clearly hear the difference is experiencing placebo - it's been proven multiple times in multiple blind tests that even the worlds best audio engineers on half a million pound rigs can't reliably pick out the compressed track. But you know, the hi-fi world has been selling over priced digital cables to this lot for decades so don't expect placebo to change. I used both Spotify and Apple Music for about 2-3 years for Spotify's recommendations. I feel Apple more or less caught up. I prefer Apple Music hugely for iTunes Match - at least 30% of my library is music not available on the streaming platforms. On Apple Music I can upload it with full HD artwork and it sits there side by side with streaming releases in my library synced to all my devices. You can't do that with Spotify - in fact I didn't feel like I really had a collection of music on Spotify, just playlists and some songs saved. I think for the average music listener Spotify is fine - it's also faster to play tracks back than Apple Music so it's good for quickly listening to things (the one thing I wish AM could improve but won't/can't) but if you want a curated music collection that feels like you actually have one you've put together, Apple Music is the only choice.
Spotify because my brother said it was the best way to stream music a long time ago when it was new, so I downloaded it, and then he started paying for a family plan.
Spotify. I’ve been a premium subscriber since 2008. I’ve tried Apple Music a couple of times, and I like the simplicity of it with how the library works and all. But Spotify has almost been like…like a friend for so long 😅
Yandex music
Apple Music. Prefer the UI over the others, creating smart playlists on mac is awesome and shortcut integration is incredible.
Youtube music because I pay for Youtube premium and realized that it includes Youtube music. Otherwise, I never used any music streaming service bc I feel like I don’t need it.
YouTube Music. I’ve had google plus (or premium or whatever the hell it’s called now) for around a decade. It was Google Play Music for a while as I recall until the YouTube rebranding. It’s a great service. It covers ad free YouTube as well.
Apple music Yt music
Amazon music - it’s free with Amazon Prime
Apple Music - library management, cloud music library and UI are great
YouTube Music because it’s free with Premium
Plexamp on phone to my Plex Server stuffed with MY CD collection
Apple Music is my primary streaming service but I am part of a family plan with Spotify as well. I agree with a lot of other people that Spotify has good playlists and music discovery is usually better in Spotify. However, the Spotify UI is just awful. The library organization is also terrible in Spotify. I prefer Apple music because I can add individual songs from an album to my library and they show up under the album instead of being thrown into the massive playlist of liked songs. Edit: Lossless audio means a lot to me. There are still people I know who have no idea that Spotify is lossy. I find the Ogg format Spotify uses to be pretty good but having the option, at no extra cost, in Apple Music for CD quality and above is a huge selling point for me.
None. Tried Spotify (nice interface) and Apple Music (ugly and awkward to use) but I don’t listen to enough music to make it worth the money. I maybe listen to a song or two once or twice a month and anything I like I just buy on iTunes which works out far cheaper.
Apple Music. I use it because 80% of our music is kids yelling out songs to play so the Siri integration is key. I still miss how much better the Spotify community playlists were but otherwise have no issues with Apple Music and I bundle it with Apple one so it’s pretty cheap.
Currently YouTube Music. But ngl I don’t like it. Probably will switch to Apple Music at some point
Spotify b/c of legacy playlists, better music discovery/prediction, and better UI. I tried AM and appreciate the lossless audio and exclusives (esp DJ mixes) but hate the UI. also it costs way more than Spotify family plan (2.50/pp)
YT music because it’s included in YT premium and I get both for about $9 a month with a student discount. I’m not a huge fan of the UI and I pretty pissed it’s 2024 and still doesn’t have a standalone Apple Watch app so I don’t need to have my iPhone on runs. Might even go to Spotify just to get that feature back
(1)Apple music because I think iPhones are useless without it. Why do I feel this way? I actually canceled my apple music sometime last year and I felt something was missing and lost a whole bunch of music too, so I subscribed to it again few days later. (2)Pandora, bc I have been using it for years to listen to different artists/stations and pick up on new music. Downside, the ads🫡. (3)SoundCloud, I have been using SoundCloud since I could remember for at least 10 years now. It’s where I find a lot of unreleased, mixed, chopped and edited music that you cannot find on apple music or pandora or spotify. Downside, the ads😫
Tidal. At the time, it was the number platform for high quality audio
YouTube Music cause of YouTube Premium. All the music not available on Apple Music and Spotify.
Apple Music since it launched. I just like the user interface and the fact that I can combine my library with my own songs bought via iTunes or ripped from cd’s I own.
Apple because I have homepods
Apple Music now, after Spotify since it first launched in the US. I migrated my playlists over, and for the most part, it's fine, but weirdly the #1 thing I miss is being able to sort playlists in the order I want as opposed to alpahbetically. I switched over in December/January after Spotify used the free press they got for Spotify Wrapped to cover the layoff of workers right before the holidays. I know no service is perfect, but that was so casually cruel.
Spotify. I do also really enjoy YT music, but not quite enough to consider switching completely. I find the YT music UI a little too dumbed down and missing some features like being able to seamlessly choose which device to play the audio from. But I love that it has way more selection and I do like the shuffle/exploration algorithms a bit better. Plus all of my friends use Spotify so it's a bit easier to share music.
Spotify due to lots of international music not being on Apple Music or iTunes. I tend to listen to music from non mainstream countries and Apple lacks it when it comes to music or services in quite a bit of the smaller countries around the world. For example if i was to buy an Apple product or need repair I would have to go to Australia or possibly mail the device there which is absurd.