In 2021, Spotify announced that there would be a new option coming to its streaming platform — Spotify HiFi. The idea? To bring hi-res streaming to Spotify and its users, rather than the lower quality streaming that we’d been lumping it with for years prior.
Cut now to three years into the future, and three whole other streaming services introducing hi-res streaming (and actually following through), and Spotify still won’t give us a proper date for the release of its higher-quality streaming service. The firm’s CEO has spoken about the release, and apparently it's still coming — although, as always, there’s no news about when.
Vaporware
Vaporware
Noun
Software or hardware that has been advertised but is not yet available to buy, either because it is only a concept or because it is still being written or designed.
That’s the definition of vaporware that Google gives, and Spotify HiFi is starting to feel like it fits the bill pretty well. It was announced, it’s sat around as a kind of vague idea for a while, and other companies have since beaten it to the punch. Like Apple’s AirPower, id Software’s Commander Keen: The Universe Is Toast!, and Half-Life 2: Episode 3, Spotify HiFi feels more and more like something that’s never going to arrive. You’ll even find it on Wikipedia’s list of vaporware, to really hammer it all home.
Whether it will see the light of day like some Vaporware remains to be seen, but for now, it remains in app purgatory, probably being rung through on a rack in a hieronymus bosch painting. But there’s more to it than that — and why it remains vaporware, and not just a feature that could have been.
Spotify keeps talking about it as if it's something that we can still expect. Most recently, the CEO has stated on the company's earnings call that it’s on the way, and given us more of an idea of what it’s going to look like. He says that it’s going to come with more control, whatever that means, and it’s going to cost you “something like $5 above the premium tier.” That puts the new tier at around $18, and potentially even more than that if ‘something like’ ends up being greater than $5. That would make it the single most expensive music streaming service around — more than Apple Music’s $9.99 per month, more than Tidals $9.99 per month, more even than Qobuz.
So.
At what point should Spotify simply… not?
There are so many more options out there
We’ve established that Spotify will be more expensive than every other service out there, but why should you move to them instead? Beyond, you know. The savings. And the fulfilled promise of hi-res streaming. Better apps, more control over offline music, comprehensive online FLAC stores…
Honestly, though, Apple Music is all that most people are ever going to need. Top-quality streaming, a massive library, Apple Music classical, and human-curated playlists all add together for a great experience. It’s going to cost you less, and if you’re an iPhone user, it comes preinstalled on your device.
Spotify’s HiFi tier might never be coming — but there are loads of options out there that won’t cost the world. And, you know. Actually exist.
