I’ve had an Apple Music subscription for years and use it A LOT. I tried some alternatives (Tidal, Sirius, and maybe one other?) and wasn’t super happy with the options.

Is there a service that people recommend that is good, like $10/month or less, maybe gives better pay to artists? I’d like to spend on a better company if possible too. If Apple has enough money to buy gold trinkets for elected officials they probably don’t need more from me.

  • johnofrobotz@news.girolab.foo
    5·
    1 day ago

    Qobuz has a streaming plan, and you can buy and download drm-free music. It’s a good option if you want to just stream (the app has added some nice improvements lately). Even better if you’re also looking to build your collection and looking to go the whole non-streaming route.

    Purchases tend to be pricey, and there’s a slightly more expensive plan with a discount on drm-free that might make sense, depending on how often you plan to make purchases.

    Edit: this currently doesn’t fall into the < $10 category but is comparable to the old Apple Music price.

    • bss03@infosec.pubEnglish
      5·
      20 hours ago

      Another fairly happy Qobuz user here. Prior to that I used Tidal, which has a better Android Auto experience, IMO. Prior to that I used YouTube Music, and technically I still have a subscription to that because I got used to YouTube Red (now Premium) when it came free with Google Music (now YouTube Music). I prefer a streaming service; I find it much easier to discover music that way.

      For digital purchases, while that is possible through Qobuz, every artist I know would prefer you buy from their Bandcamp. ISTR Bandcamp might have been doing some shady anti-union stuff, but I could be misremembering and I wouldn’t know of any great alternatives.

      • bss03@infosec.pubEnglish
        2·
        20 hours ago

        They used to provide like a 3-day trial, but I couldn’t find any sort of offer like that currently active.

        If you are just curious about what they have on their streaming service, you can get a rough estimate by browsing their download store. It’s not a perfect match, but it’s very close. It is quite rare for an artist / studio / publisher to let Qobuz stream it but not sell a download or vice-versa.