One way to feel different types of emotions is to listen to music. It can get you excited or make you feel relaxed. Music is an important part of our lives and there are various music streaming service providers in the market. A major player in the music industry is Spotify. It’s an audio streaming and media service that gives access to millions of songs and content from creators across the globe. With that in mind, we’ll analyze the advantages and disadvantages of Spotify.
The best part about this service provider is that it gives easy and free access to unlimited songs. It has an ad-supported free version that allows you to browse your favorite songs and listen to them online.
Additionally, it provides a premium version, where you go ad-free and listen to music of higher quality. Further, users can download songs for offline listening. Now that you have an overview of Spotify, let’s delve straight into its pros and cons.
Advantages of Spotify
With the endless songs that the service offers, you can explore different music genres and listen to artists across the world. This is the first of the upsides of Spotify.
1. It is easy to use
Spotify is aiming to make its presence across the globe and its availability in 184 countries speaks for itself. On top of that, the application is straightforward to use, allowing users to get started with a few clicks or taps. If you want to use this platform, all you need is an internet connection and your email address to start listening to music.
Plus, if you have a Facebook account, you can use it to create a Spotify account. Finally, once you have registered an account, you can create a playlist for different occasions.
2. Spotify provides a tailored listening experience
The customer-centric model of Spotify with the feature of providing free access to content makes it an indisputable leader in the music industry. Based on various factors such as theme, mood, gender, and age, Spotify has curated more than 80 million tracks along with 4 billion playlists for its users. That’s one of the reasons it has 406 million active users at the time of publication.
In fact, listening to music is just one part, Spotify also allows its users to upload their tracks from their devices. That’s mostly why they add over 60,000 songs daily.
3. It is available on multiple platforms
Whether you are an Android or an iOS user, you can easily download the Spotify application on your device. Not only this, but the Spotify application is also available on Microsoft Windows and Apple macOS computers. In fact, it was reported last year that the total number of Spotify app downloads exceeded 1 billion in the Android market.
Undoubtedly, it is a major milestone that was accomplished. But there’s more, you can access the Spotify app even from Linux, Open Pandora, Xbox, and PlayStation. This compatibility gives Spotify a competitive edge in the music industry.
4. Spotify allows sharing music experiences
We already mentioned that Spotify allows users to register using their Facebook accounts. Once you have connected via Facebook, you can easily share your music experience with your friends and family. With a few clicks, you can also share your favorite songs with anyone worldwide. Along with this, they can also see what you are listening to in real-time.
5. It gives access to the massive music library
Spotify provides both free and premium versions to its users. But irrespective of that, Spotify users get access to massive music libraries. From songs to podcasts, the users can surely find something they like.
Also, there are around 3.2 million podcasts available on Spotify, and many more are added each day. Plus, upgrading to the premium version allows users to save up to 10,000 songs on five different devices individually. The saved playlists are available for listening offline.
Disadvantages of Spotify
Premium users can get a seamless listening experience, but that’s not the case for its free users. Here are some other downsides of using Spotify to listen to music without downloading.
1. It is expensive
While Spotify has a free version, only limited features are available to such users. Upgrading to the premium version is expensive. That’s because excellent features are available with an upgrade. Also, there is a possibility that even after upgrading to the premium version, there would be months when you won’t use the application. Therefore, premium users who don’t use the service regularly might find it pricey.
2. Spotify shows advertisements
As we pointed out previously, the free version is supported by ads. These users have to listen to audio advertisements between the songs. This frustrates the listener, especially when the ad pops up in between their favorite songs or while listening to podcasts. The only way to get rid of the annoying ads is to upgrade to the premium version, which, as we have examined above, can be expensive.
3. It offers low sound quality to free users
Like ads, free users get low sound quality. The maximum bitrate at which free users can stream music is 128kbps on desktop and 160kbps on mobile. Whereas with the premium version, you can stream music at 320kbps on both desktop and mobile. If you choose to upgrade to the premium version, you may experience music of drastically better quality.
4. Spotify requires an internet connection
Spotify is a major player, but there are good competitors in the music industry. Compared to other music streaming service providers, the major drawback of Spotify is that it requires an internet connection all the time. Unless you are upgrading to the premium version and saving songs, there’s no way you can listen to music offline. In contrast, the competition allows offline listening without requesting an upgrade to the premium version.
5. It is not universally available
Spotify was founded in Stockholm, Sweden, and it is expanding its services globally. Initially, it was available only in a few countries and gradually included more. However, Spotify is still not available universally, i.e., there are some countries where Spotify does not provide its services. People from those regions will have to wait until the service becomes available there.
Reasons to Pick Spotify Over Competition
We all love listening to Music. Music is one of the most powerful things in the world. It has the power to change your mood from sad to good, and vice-versa. It has also been a great source of entertainment for humans for centuries.
Without music, the world feels empty, and we also do not want to be in a place where we do not feel the vibe. So, it is obvious we will love a platform that is the source of millions of songs. And when we talk about music in the modern world, the first thing that comes to our mind is Spotify.
Spotify is a digital music service provider that has millions of songs, podcasts, and videos from artists all over the world in its arsenal. It has one of the biggest music libraries.
No matter which type of song you want to listen to or who is your favorite artist, you can find everything on Spotify. If you have a premium membership of Spotify, you can even download the songs you like and then listen whenever you want at your convenience.
One of the best things about Spotify is that you can access it on multiple platforms. There is a Spotify app that you can download from your app store, and you can access the platform from its website as well.
Spotify has revolutionized the music streaming industry and put a hold on illegal downloads, which used to be the case. Now, users can legally stream music and compensate artists based on the streaming numbers.
There are plenty of features that Spotify offers to its users. You can make playlists based on your taste. Also, the algorithm of Spotify will recommend songs based on your listening history.
Here is a short list of the features of Spotify:
- Personalized music discovery with Discover Weekly and Daily Mix playlists.
- Cross-platform compatibility (iOS, Android, Windows, Mac).
- Collaborative playlists allow you to make playlists with friends.
- Integration with many devices such as Amazon Echo, Google Home, gaming consoles, etc.
- High-quality sound for Premium members.
- Social features such as following friends and sharing playlists.
- Podcast availability in addition to a vast music library.
- Offline listening for Premium users.