After eight years of whispers, three years of "coming later this year" teases, and countless frustrated audiophile threads on forums, Spotify has at last unleashed lossless audio.
Announced back in 2021 as part of a mysterious "HiFi" tier, the feature — now simply branded as "Lossless Listening" — began rolling out on September 10 to Premium subscribers in over a dozen markets, including the US, UK, Germany, Japan, Australia, and more. By October, it promises to blanket 50+ countries. The best part? No extra charge. It's baked right into your existing Premium plan, a nod to the competitive pressures from rivals who've been serving up uncompressed tunes for years.
This isn't just a technical tweak; it's Spotify catching up in the audio arms race. For the uninitiated, lossless audio streams music in formats like FLAC (Free Lossless Audio Codec) that preserve every bit of the original recording, ditching the compression artifacts that plague standard streams.
Spotify's implementation caps out at 24-bit/44.1 kHz — CD quality on steroids, but without the ultra-high-res fireworks of 24-bit/192 kHz that Apple Music, Tidal, and Qobuz flaunt. Sure, you'll need a setup worth more than a used Honda Civic to truly discern the difference, but for casual listeners upgrading from Spotify's old 320kbps max, it's a noticeable leap in clarity and depth.
The Rollout: Devices, Indicators, and a Few Caveats
Spotify's keeping it straightforward: Head to Settings > Playback > Audio Quality, toggle on "Lossless," and you're golden—for Wi-Fi streams, at least. Cellular and downloads get the treatment too, but expect a brief buffering hiccup as those beefier files load. Nearly every track in Spotify's vast library will be available in lossless, marked with a subtle "Lossless" badge in the Now Playing bar and Connect Picker.
Device support kicks off strong with wired or Wi-Fi-connected gear from Sony, Bose, Samsung, and Sennheiser. Bluesound, Yamaha, Denon, and Marantz join the party at launch, while Sonos and Amazon integrations are slated for next month. Bluetooth? Not yet — its bandwidth bottleneck forces compression, so Spotify recommends ditching the wireless for now. Premium users will get an in-app notification when it's live on their account, with the full global rollout stretching into November.
This free-for-Premium approach feels like a savvy play. Rumors of a pricier "deluxe" or "Music Pro" tier—potentially bundling spatial audio or even higher-res streams—have swirled for years, and this could be the appetizer. As Spotify's co-president Gustav Söderström hinted in past interviews, they're prioritizing "quality and ease of use" while leaving room to evolve.
Catching Up to the Competition: Better Late Than Never?
Spotify's tardiness is the stuff of memes. The first leaks surfaced in 2017, but the official 2021 announcement promised a dedicated HiFi subscription that never materialized—delayed by licensing woes, internal pivots, and the streaming wars.
Meanwhile, competitors sprinted ahead:
Apple Music, in particular, threw down the gauntlet by including lossless (and Spatial Audio) gratis since 2021, forcing Spotify to rethink its strategy. No wonder: Charging extra now would've been tone-deaf after recent price hikes in 2023, 2024, and 2025.
Critics might nitpick the 44.1 kHz ceiling — true hi-res enthusiasts will grumble that it doesn't touch the "audiophile nirvana" of higher sample rates. But for 99% of users jamming on AirPods or car speakers, this is plenty. It bolsters Spotify's edge in discovery tools like AI Playlists and Daylists, making Premium feel even more indispensable.
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What It Means for Listeners — and the Industry
In a sea of sameness, Spotify's lossless drop is a win for accessibility. It democratizes better sound without gatekeeping it behind another paywall, potentially stemming subscriber churn to hi-res holdouts. For artists and labels, it means more fidelity for their masters, though the real game-changer might be that rumored super-tier lurking on the horizon.
If you've been holding out for this, dust off those over-ears — your playlists just got a whole lot richer. Spotify's finally swimming in the lossless pool, even if it's not diving deepest yet.
