Could lossless streaming on Spotify actually be happening this time? We’ve been through so many twists and turns with this saga already, but there’s new cause for hope. Code snippets in recent builds of Spotify for Android yet again tease the possibility of the company’s long-delayed lossless audio coming in the near future.
After originally being known three years ago as “Spotify HiFi” and then rumored to be part of a more expensive “Supremium” subscription tier, it seems like Spotify has again pivoted on strategy. Instead of having it be part of the Superpremium tier, according to Reddit user Hypixely, who has been trudging through a lot of this code to try and piece together Spotify’s plans, “Superpremium is dead.”
But before panic sets in, Spotify is launching the new Music Pro as an “optional” add-on (there will be a button on the sidebar called “Your Music Pro,” similar to the “Your Plan” button) that will include lossless audio.
More features that Hypixely confirms will be included in Music Pro:
- Advanced Mixing tools
- There are a lot of new strings but the idea is the same as I detailed in my previous post
- Filter library by mood, activity, genre
- Lossless
- Up to 24-bit/44.1 kHz FLAC
- Judging from the strings, the playback quality might be displayed while listening, like Apple Music does
- Headphones Enhancement / Optimization
- You will be able to select your headphones model and “lift your headphones’ performance using patented technology”
- Also works with AirPods
Those will let Spotify subscribers tinker with tracks in a whole new way. So, Music Pro isn’t another plan per se, but something you’ll be able to tack onto Spotify Premium for an as-yet-unknown price. Hypixely also believes Music Pro will allow more advanced library filtering (by mood, genre, etc.). Spotify is pushing further into AI playlists, but it’s not certain whether those will be part of the Music Pro add-on.
If you want to confirm the coming changes to Spotify yourself, the strings can be found on Spotify 8.9.30.433 (Hypixely states that he got them from the alpha version 8.9.32.328).
Hopefully, we will be able to enjoy lossless on Spotify some time this century.
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