When the plan will arrive, however, is still unknown, with Söderström only able to confirm to The Verge that HiFi "is coming at some point. We even got a Billie Eilish featuring ad and everything. The high-quality streams would, the company said, be rolling out in select markets later this year. Given Apple and Amazon's moves, Spotify's lossless is now expected to appear as part of a more extensive plan that includes access to spatial audio tracks and other perks to do with audiobooks and podcasts. Spotify HiFi rumours have circled for years, but in February 2021 a new tier was officially announced that offered CD-quality music using a lossless compression format. "I'm not allowed to comment on our label agreements, nor on what other players in the industry did, for obvious reasons," he added.Īccording to The Verge, Spotify HiFi has been ready to launch for more than a year, and Spotify employees have access to HiFi, but it was originally intended to cost more than the standard plan. However, in April 2021, the company announced a price hike for US and UK Family plan subscribers, effectively bringing the price up to 15.99. "We want to do it in a way where it works for us from a cost perspective as well," Söderström continued. Much like every other popular streaming platform in the industry, Spotify’s Family subscription plan used to go for 14.99. The industry changed and we had to adapt." "We are going to do it, but we're going to do it in a way where it makes sense for us and for our listeners. "We announced it, but then the industry changed for a bunch of reasons," Spotify co-president Gustav Söderström said on Tuesday in an interview with The Verge. That's made the idea of Spotify asking users to pay more for a like-for-like service sound a lot less reasonable. Since then, Apple Music has included lossless listening options as part of its standard subscription price, and Amazon has stopped charging extra for its lossless music library. Originally it said the tier would go live by the end of 2021, but similar moves by rival streaming services upended Spotify's lossless strategy. It's been more than two years since Spotify announced it would introduce a "HiFi" premium tier that would give users access to a catalog of CD-quality music tracks. Spotify says it still plans to launch a lossless music experience, although when that will be and what form it will take still appear undecided.
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