It’s been a little over two years since Spotify unveiled Spotify HiFi with the promise that it would be released later in 2021 – despite that, we’re still here today without better quality than 320 kbit/s on Spotify.
So what happened to the subscription with higher quality? In a new interview with Spotify’s product manager Gustav Söderström, he reveals that HiFi is still in the works for Spotify and will come eventually. He says this in the interview:
– We announced it, but then the industry changed for a bunch of reasons… We are going to do it, but we’re going to do it in a way where it makes sense for us and for our listeners. The industry changed and we had to adapt.
Since Spotify announced HiFi, Apple Music, among others, has given its users access to lossless at no extra cost, which may have put a spanner in the works for Spotify, which would probably charge more for better quality.
Listen to the whole interview:
The Verge has recently learned that Spotify HiFi has been ready to go for more than a year. The technical work to bring the feature to market is largely complete, and the company has re-ingested its entire music catalog in lossless quality. Spotify employees have access to HiFi.
