Latest news with #ChrisMessina
Yahoo
01-08-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Spotify HiFi: release date rumors, price predictions, and everything we know so far
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. For fans of high-fidelity audio, Spotify HiFi could be the Holy Grail. After unveiling its plans for lossless, CD-quality audio in 2021, audiophiles around the world have been patiently waiting for Spotify to bridge that gap to competitor services like Tidal and Apple Music. Though it's still one of our best music streaming services, Spotify has yet to deliver its highly anticipated HiFi tier. It's been almost five years, but we are closer to the release of Spotify HiFi than ever before. When it comes to the hi-res audio game, Apple and Amazon are leaps and bounds ahead of Spotify. Since 2021 subscribers of both services have been able to reap the benefits of lossless audio quality at no extra cost, so what's gone wrong with Spotify? It's a question we're still asking ourselves to this day, but recently Spotify has been dropping more hints about its HiFi tier which we can now point to a late 2025 release date. Unfortunately, even when Spotify HiFi does drop, we have reason to believe that it will only be available in 'select markets' to start. And while Spotify hasn't said exactly how much the service will cost just yet, we're confident that the Spotify HiFi tier will cost more than the current standard premium subscription which sits at $11.99/ £11.99/ AU$13.99 - and there's no guarantee that every song in the entire Spotify catalog will have a HiFi version available. In spite of this very clear downside, we have good reason to believe that Spotify HiFi songs will be available to save and download to your devices for offline listening, which means you should be able to take your new lossless music library with you anywhere. Ready to make the leap to lossless? Here's everything we know about Spotify HiFi. Spotify HiFi release date rumors After five years since Spotify unveiled its plans to introduce lossless audio to enhance music listening for its subscribers, a recent Bloomberg ($/£) report says that Spotify HiFi is tipped to launch in late 2025 and will be called Spotify Music Pro. Not only will this new subscription tier give you the long-awaited lossless audio you've been waiting for, but will include additional benefits such as remixing tools (including some AI-powered features for mashing tracks together), and even special offers on live music and concert tickets. The latest update comes from tech expert Chris Messina, who found several references to "Lossless" with a capital L in the latest code for the Spotify desktop app. These point to promotional messages inside the app – "The best way to listen in Lossless is with Spotify Connect" – and alerts such as "we're sorry, this track isn't in Lossless yet" or "Looks like your internet connection is having a hard time supporting Lossless right now." Prior to these findings, Spotify's Open House event in May saw the company implying that it's currently looking at ways to improve the music streaming experience for 'superfans'. In addition to admitting it made mistakes with Wrapped 2024, CEO Daniel Ek had the following to say: 'What more things can we do like Fans First that scales, and that provides a great experience for the artist, and provides a great experience for the consumer?", adding "I do agree that the need – the creator need or the artist need – exists. And the consumer need is there too. The question is just how do you create a great experience?'. Spotify HiFi was expected to arrive in 2021, and one of the first leaks we came across was back then when a user on Reddit shared a video seemingly pointing to the HiFi onboarding process - but that was five years ago. Back in March, Spotify ran into a number of bug issues including one that showed ads to Premium subscribers, and while we can't directly connect this to the rollout of Spotify HiFi it's definitely raised our suspicions about what Spotify has going on behind-the-scenes. In a 2021 blog post, Spotify stated the following; "Beginning later this year, Premium subscribers in select markets will be able to upgrade their sound quality to Spotify HiFi and listen to their favorite songs the way artists intended,". Initially, Spotify CEO Daniel Ek claimed that the delay in adding Spotify HiFi has largely come down to licensing issues. Aside from licensing rights, the Spotify HiFi delay can be attributed to its undivided attention to its social features such as Spotify Wrapped, and its mission to bring more AI integrations to its user experience; its AI DJ feature and generative Daylist feature (one which I frequent regularly) are two of its most popular AI tools. Recently, we reported on Spotify's plans to 'double down' on music in 2025 which we believe could go down one of two paths; either the long-awaited HiFi tier or more AI advancements. It's also worth focusing on that select markets bit as it means we won't see Spotify HiFi going live in every territory at the same time. Previously, when Spotify has rolled out new features it usually starts with the US and Europe, but now that the service is available in more than 180 markets, it's hard to say which will be among the first to get the new service. The other issue you'll run into regarding Spotify HiFi's release date – whenever it is eventually announced – is that it's unlikely that every Spotify Connect device will get the upgrade at the same time – which means some speakers like, say, the Sonos One and PS5 might get it long before your slightly older AV receiver. Spotify HiFi price predictions According to the recent Bloomberg report, if the rumors of Spotify Music Pro are true then it could cost you an additional $5 a month on top of its $12 Premium plan. This means that it could be a 50% price rise, presumably costing an additional £6 in the UK and AU$7 in Australia. Previously, we had reason to believe that Spotify HiFi would launch as a brand new subscription tier but the new rumors point to our past guesses that Spotify HiFi would be a new Music Pro feature, as well as a $5 add-on for the Premium Plan. Spotify Premium currently stands at a monthly cost of $11.99/ £11.99/ AU$13.99 therefore if the $5 add-on rumors are true, we'd venture a guess that Spotify HiFi could cost between $14.99 and $19.99 which feels like a safe bet. Speaking of new add-ons, recently a leaked image on X (see below) shows text in the Spotify iOS beta app saying "Explore plans and get more from your Premium experience with add-ons". While we don't know what these add-ons will consist of, they would give credibility to the Bloomberg rumors and mark a big change in Spotify's subscription tier system. What's also influencing our previous guesses is the competition: a Tidal subscription will run you $19.99 per month, while Hi-Res Audio streaming services like Qobuz and Deezer cost $14.99 and $11.99 per month. Amazon Music Unlimited and Apple Music are a bit cheaper and now include lossless streaming options, and it's possible Spotify HiFi could be around the same price if it ever launches. On the prices front, The Financial Times ($/£) recently dropped a report hinting at an upcoming price hike. According to it's coverage Spotify will be increasing the cost of an individual subscription by €1 (about $1/£1) as soon as June, but this will only apply to subscribers in Europe and Latin American countries, and not those in the US who received a price hike just last year. Spotify HiFi audio quality So, just how good will Spotify HiFi's lossless audio be? It will supposedly sound, at the very least, as good as a CD does – and maybe a bit better. According to Spotify, Spotify HiFi will stream CD-quality lossless audio to your devices. Ideally, those devices will be connected to a network and capable of using Spotify Connect, otherwise, you'll have to pipe it over Bluetooth which will likely diminish the quality. In the absence of Spotify HiFi, you can amend your audio streaming quality in your account settings to add somewhat of an improvement to your listening experience. Just go to your Spotify settings, and tap 'Audio Quality'. That's a heck of a lot better than Spotify's current offering of 320kbps, and will likely bring the service's potential audio quality up to par with Tidal, Deezer, and maybe even Apple's Digital Masters. Speaking of Apple Digital Masters, there's always a chance that Spotify might also go above and beyond hi-fi with 96kHz / 24-bit audio, but we're not holding our breath. So what does that all mean? In a very practical sense, lossless audio formats have more details and data than their lossy counterparts. That means hearing new details in songs you've never heard before that otherwise might've been cut out when the data was compressed. It should also sound a bit wider and more immersive, though, a lot of it will depend on which headphones or speakers you use, too. Spotify HiFi song catalog The murkiest detail of all for Spotify HiFi is how many – and which – songs from Spotify's more than 100 million-song catalog will be included. The safest assumption we can make is that it won't support every song in Spotify's vast catalog, but millions of them should be. Among those will likely be top hits from major record labels which already distribute the files to other services, while some music from smaller labels and older legacy titles likely won't make the cut. We'll keep our ears to the ground for more details on which songs will make the cut, but for now, it's probably best to keep your CD collection right where it is until new details emerge. You might also like I changed this one small Spotify feature and it made my music sound dramatically better My top 5 tips to make more of your Spotify playlists – and trust me, I'm a playlist obsessive Forget Spotify – I'm going all-in on Bandcamp for music in 2025, here's why you should too
Yahoo
09-07-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Stephanie Murphy declares candidacy for Orange County mayor
Former U.S. Rep. Stephanie Murphy, a Democrat who forged a reputation for bipartisanship during her tenure in Congress, declared her candidacy today to succeed Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings, likely becoming the front-runner to lead Florida's fifth-largest county. Murphy, 46, said she has the experience and leadership skills to navigate a bitterly divided political landscape. 'One of the important reasons to have strong leadership at the local level is because of what is happening at the federal and state level,' she said. 'I think you need leaders who have demonstrated the ability to work with anybody who's willing to work with them.' Her declared opponents include Orange County Clerk of Courts Tiffany Moore Russell and Orange County Commissioner Mayra Uribe, both Democrats, and tech entrepreneur Chris Messina, a Republican. Former Congresswoman Val Demings, a rumored candidate to succeed her husband, announced last month she would not run. Murphy had served as a civilian national security specialist in the U.S. Department of Defense and as a business instructor at Rollins College when Democrats chose her to take on 24-year GOP incumbent stalwart John Mica in 2016 and she narrowly won in a upset. She made history as the first Vietnamese-American woman elected to Congress. In her final year in Congress, she served on the Jan. 6 Committee investigating the attack on the U.S. Capitol by supporters of President Donald Trump, who denied he lost the 2020 election. She voted with committee members to recommend prosecution of Trump. Murphy left her House seat by choice. Murphy leaves Congress as bipartisan dealmaker. Could 2024 Senate race beckon? Murphy said Jerry Demings, a fellow Democrat, had done a 'fine job' as mayor leading the county over the past eight years. But the region's rapid growth — the county has an estimated 1.5 million residents — will greatly challenge his successor, she said. 'It's going to be a different next four years than it has been for the last eight,' Murphy said. 'I want people who are growing up and living and working in Orange County to have access to that American dream that the affordability crisis is putting out of their reach.' She said transportation is a critical piece of what makes the community livable. Murphy pushed back against the notion she was now the front-runner to be the county government's elected chief executive. 'I don't take any voter's vote for granted,' she said. 'I'm going to run this campaign the way that I've run every campaign which is with some humility and to start by getting people together and listening to the issues that the community faces, and then offer solutions…' A mother of two children, ages 14 and 11, Murphy did not offer specific plans for the affordability or transportation challenges. 'Orange County is home for me, too, and I am looking forward to running a strong campaign where I talk to everybody in every corner of this county,' she said. 'I hope I get a chance to bring my decades of experience in business and a nonpartisan-results- oriented approach to the important work that has to be done to continue to make Orange County a welcoming place that's livable for everyone.' The mayor's post pays $247,938. shudak@
The Verge
04-07-2025
- The Verge
Believe (in Spotify HiFi).
Believe (in Spotify HiFi). If you're still waiting for Spotify's lossless audio offering , Chris Messina notes that the 9.0.58 update that rolled out a couple of days ago on Android has new changes hinting at the feature for settings tied to cellular downloading and checking storage space. It's similar to what we saw last month, but after all these years, how long will it take to turn into something everyone can use?
Tom's Guide
20-06-2025
- Tom's Guide
Spotify just tipped to finally bring lossless audio to the masses — here's what we know
Several different sources have reportedly found code in Spotify's desktop app and web player hinting that lossless HD audio is coming to Spotify. The desktop app and web player code were spotted by Chris Messina (via TechCrunch) and Spicetify (via The Verge). Additionally, the latest beta for the iPhone version of the app was spotted by Aaron Perris and MacRumors. According to some lines found by Perris, Spotify's lossless audio will be 24-bit at 44.1 kHz. "Introducing the best sound quality on Spotify: for music in up to 24-bit/44.1 kHz." For the unfamiliar, lossless audio means that songs retain all the data from the original recordings, which generally results in higher quality. It's unclear from the code when Spotify might release lossless audio to subscribers, but it's been a long time coming and may cost you more money to access. Spotify users have been waiting at least four years for lossless audio. The music streamer first announced a new Hi-Fi tier featuring lossless audio in 2021. It appeared we were closer to finally getting the feature last year, with rumors of a new Spotify Deluxe subscriber tier and reports that it would cost $5 more than the existing premium subscription. Get instant access to breaking news, the hottest reviews, great deals and helpful tips. In February, a Bloomberg article claimed that the elusive Deluxe tier was finally coming this year with another new name — Music Pro, the fourth name in as many years after HiFi, Supremium and Deluxe. The report indicated that Spotify might charge up to $5.99 per month for HD audio, in addition to Spotify Premium. The lack of a high-end lossless HD audio tier has been baffling for years, especially as competitors like Apple Music, Amazon Music Unlimited, and Tidal, which already offer lossless audio, often at a lower cost than the rumors suggest Spotify's price would be. Apple Music introduced its version of lossless audio back in 2021, around the same time Spotify announced its HiFi service.
India Today
20-06-2025
- India Today
When will Spotify get lossless audio? Code references once again say it is coming
Spotify's long-rumoured lossless audio tier has been on hold for a long time, but now new signs suggest it might finally launch soon. Despite promising a high-fidelity streaming option back in 2021, dubbed Spotify HiFi at the time, the company is yet to announce the feature. But some tipsters have been digging into Spotify's latest desktop app update and concluded that the long wait could soon be per a report by TechCrunch, Chris Messina, a technologist and reverse engineer, was among the first to highlight new code references to 'lossless' in the most recent version of Spotify's desktop client. These tantalising fragments appear to involve help cards that would guide listeners on using the feature, a strong signal that the service hasn't been forgotten. TechCrunch also picked up on the findings, reporting that these snippets include phrases like 'Lossless music, now in premium,' as well as descriptions pointing to 'the best sound quality on Spotify for music up to 24-bit/44.1 kHz.'If that weren't enough, other help cards imply lossless playback might come with caveats. One mentions that certain tracks won't support lossless playback, while another suggests that a stable internet connection is a must for buffer-free streaming. Yet another tip advises that lossless audio is 'best enjoyed on devices compatible with Spotify Connect and/or wired devices,' which would make sense given the bandwidth requirements for high-resolution And it's not just Messina making these discoveries. The X account for Spicetify, a popular command-line tool that lets you modify the Spotify client, shared screenshots of what looks like a hidden lossless setting buried in the app's streaming-quality options. Spicetify also noted seeing lossless references across Spotify Connect and in the web player, further fanning the flames of anticipation. Although these tiny breadcrumbs will excite audiophiles and die-hard Spotify users alike, there's still no official word on a launch date. The company first unveiled its plans for a lossless tier back in 2021, promising CD-quality sound for premium listeners. However, those ambitions appeared to stall, with licensing roadblocks often cited as a key factor. Spotify even told investors at one point that licensing hurdles were delaying the rollout. That picture could be looking rosier this year, especially after the streamer inked new deals with major labels like Warner Music and Universal Music Group in early 2025, a move that might have smoothed over earlier rights issues. If those agreements have cleared the way, then lossless audio may finally make its debut as part of a premium subscription the timing would fit neatly with other developments, too. Bloomberg previously reported that Spotify was preparing a top-tier 'Music Pro' subscription for later this year, bundling high-quality audio with extra perks like remix tools and other advanced features. Given these app hints and the new licensing deals, a formal announcement could well be on the now, though, there's still an air of 'wait and see' around Spotify's lossless ambitions. But as the company quietly lays the groundwork with these sneaky code references and revamped agreements, it looks increasingly like one of streaming music's most elusive upgrades is on its way, at long In
