Music is an experience that you can enjoy at its best only when quality, rhythm, and other factors are perfect. Now, the number of smartphone apps claiming to be perfect music apps has grown rapidly as well. However, Spotify and YouTube Music established a great reputation in the market. These best music streaming apps made competition in the industry tougher.
In this blog, we are answering the most important question- is YouTube Music better than Spotify? We will talk about the features of both music apps. Later, we will discuss their pros and cons and rate them accordingly.
So, without further ado, let’s begin!
YT Music vs Spotify- History
Surely, the introduction to both apps is not required due to their well-established recognition in the market. However, let’s have a look at the origin of YouTube Music vs Spotify apps.
History of the free Music app
The YouTube Music streaming app was first released in November 2015 as an official product of YouTube, a subsidiary of Google. In 2020, YouTube Music officially replaced Google Music and became an official app of Google. The app comes with free and paid subscriptions. We will talk more about these subscriptions later in this blog.
The YouTube Music app has also witnessed a revamp in 2018. YouTube announced a web app and a better smartphone app for YouTube Music. The revision of YouTube Music included an AI to make the recommendation factor better.
History of the Spotify offline and online music app
Daniel Ek and Martin Lorenzton founded this Swedish Music player app on April 23, 2016. Currently, Spotify is recognized as the world’s largest music streaming service with a network of over 365 million monthly active users. As of June 2021, these numbers also included 165 million premium subscribers of the service.
The service is currently available in Europe, the Americas, Oceania, Asia, and more than 42 countries of Africa. And, it includes more than 70 million songs of different genres. The Spotify audio quality is top-notch that provides the best music listening experience.
Features of the YouTube Music vs Spotify apps
Furthermore, we will discuss a few crucial features of YT Music vs Spotify apps. These features will help us in understanding the importance of both mobile apps.
1. Music Quality
The YouTube Music quality is varied in different qualities that can be adjusted depending on the network quality. Here are a few quality options that you get with the YouTube free streaming music app-
- Low quality- 48kbps
- Normal- 128kbps
- High- 256kbps
- Always high- 256kbps
In terms of the music quality, the Spotify audio quality leaves YouTube behind. Even if you take other examples like Amazon Music Player, they use audio qualities of better formats like FLAC. However, the YouTube Music app leads the competition in terms of quality for the free plan.
Here are the sound quality options that you will in Spotify, one of the top music streaming services.
- Low quality- 24kbps
- Normal quality- 96kbps
- High quality- 160kbps
- Very high quality- 320kbps
2. Free plan
The major difference between Spotify and YouTube Music app is that the Spotify app has more ads compared to the YouTube Music app. The Spotify app ads can not be skipped as well. While listening to the music for free, the Spotify app includes at least two ads after every thirty minutes of the streaming.
Moreover, the YouTube Music free app and Spotify app offer almost similar features for free. The YouTube Music app, however, can not be played in the background for the free plan. Spotify, on the other hand, allows hassle-free streaming while the screen is off or you are using other apps.
3. Premium plan
Both YouTube Music premium vs Spotify premium subscriptions are almost the same as well. With the premium subscription, you get rid of ads and unlock offline downloads. However, the YouTube Music app also gives you access to the background streaming of the music while using other apps. So, if that is your requirement, using Spotify for free is a better option.
4. Spotify premium vs YouTube Music premium subscription rates
YouTube Music premium plan comes with a one-month free trial. The plan can be purchased for a cost of $11.99 per month. Moreover, there are family and student plans as well that can save your money. The family plan costs $17.99 per month. It can be shared with family members who are 13 years or older. A maximum of 5 members can be added to the plan.
Spotify also has premium plans categorized into four parts. The Individual plan begins with $9.99 per month. The Duo plan is available for $12.99 per month and the Family plan is available for $15.99 per month. Spotify also has a Student plan that costs $4.99 per month and includes a Hulu (ad-supported) subscription.
5. Availability
The YouTube Music app is available in many countries around the world. You can find YouTube Music in the US, India, the UK, Australia, Mexico, South Korea, and more. Approximately, there are more than 80 countries around the world where the YouTube Music app can be downloaded. On the other hand, the Spotify app, one of the best lyrics apps, is available in Europe, Africa, The Americas, and Asia. The Spotify app is targeting to cover 178 countries by the end of 2021.
Pros and cons of Spotify premium vs YouTube Music apps
Furthermore, we are throwing some insight into the pros and cons of both music streaming apps.
Pros of Spotify
- Free music streaming
- Huge variety of songs
- Can be played in the background for free
- Music in many languages
Cons of Spotify
- Too many ads
- Repetitive ads
Pros of YouTube Music
- Free music streaming
- Skippable ads
- Easy to use
Cons of YouTube Music
- Can not play in the background for free
- The premium option has lower quality than Spotify
To conclude, this discussion gives us an answer to the question- which is better, Spotify or YouTube Music? Well, Spotify definitely leads the market. YouTube Music, an app by one of the app development companies, lost this battle because it can not play music in the background for free. If you pick any music streaming service, only the YouTube Music app has this unique flaw that makes it lack the lead in the competition.
Sr. Content Writer
Aman Gaur is a Senior Writer at MobileAppDaily (MAD). He is an IT engineer (as per academics) who turned to writing because of his flair for storytelling. He has an experience of 6+ years and has worked with multiple companies in many niches but primarily ‘Tech’. He has many interests that range from being a tech enthusiast to an admirer of international music and cinema. Currently, he is using his skills to help MAD expand and create valuable content for the platform, thereby, helping in improving overall traffic, leads, and branding of the company.
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