Apple has made an impressive journey to the digital music streaming service it is today. Starting out as the iTunes downloads platform, it has morphed into a streaming giant with access to high quality music streams that delivers full CD-quality music files as a bare minimum and offers spatial audio content via Dolby Atmos. There's even a dedicated Apple Music Classical app available to subscribers at no extra cost.
For
- 100 million songs in CD and hi-res sound quality
- Spatial audio
- Curated content
Against
- No free tier
- Limited support outside of Apple
Spotify has the largest market share thanks to its free tier and device support, but it's Premium tier is the one to go for. Even though its highest audio format streams are around a third of the data rate of rivals, it has an engaging sound. Spotify has more ways to discover music than any other streaming service with playlists for just about every kind of activity and tailored content that learns your listening habits.
For
- Strongest platform support
- Extensive curated content features
- Social media integration
- Great ease of use and reliable search tool
Against
- Audio quality is bettered by rivals
- Poor artist remuneration
