[CharlesW]

> Apple Music is just so increadibly bad UX wise.

Is it? When I switched to Apple Music I didn't find it remarkably better or worse then anything else I've used (including Spotify). Reviews (https://www.pcmag.com/reviews/apple-music) don't mention any UX issues either. If you know of any substantive commentary on this I'd appreciate a link.

[TobyTheDog123]

It is. In my personal experience:

- On Mac, Apple Music will just consistently stop playing audio. Force quitting & restarting fixes it.

- On iOS, the app is prone to crashing more than any iOS app I've seen. It's not horrible (I very rarely see crashing period), but it's far more than 3rd party apps or even Apple's own set.

- On iOS and on a weak connection, Music will not play even if it is downloaded. I suspect it has something to do with DRM servers, but don't know for sure.

- I once changed my iCloud password on my account, and it sent the Apple Music app into an infinite loop of trying to reload content, instead of just prompting for my password again.

- Load times are horrendous for online content, even on fiber connections.

- I don't have many complaints about discoverability, but it's certainly nowhere near Spotify's recommendation engine. Spotify's weekly-updated new music playlist is way more relevant to me than Apple Music's version (New Music Mix).

But...

- I think way more people can tell the difference between Spotify's audio quality and Apple Music's Lossless/Atmos. I sure could, and it was obvious.

[eertami]

>I think way more people can tell the difference between Spotify's audio quality and Apple Music's Lossless/Atmos. I sure could, and it was obvious.

But have you blind A/B tested this with a third party? I don't mean to be combative, but the audiophile community is ripe with this kind of thing. People claiming that a speaker cable (or sometimes even a power cable) gives them better quality audio.

And then once you blindfold them and ask them to tell which is which, suddenly the differences aren't so clear.

[TobyTheDog123]

I mean it's obviously purely anecdotal, but I would by no means consider myself an audiophile. I use Airpods Max at my desk and Airpods Pros during my run, and that's about it.

I would love to see someone do this experiment though, maybe I am an audiophile and didn't even know it.

[eertami]

You need not fear, for if you were an audiophile there is no way you could use Airpods.

Your perceived change in audio quality is more likely to be placebo in the justification of your own platform choices. Spotify high quality is certainly transparent on the equipment you use, as the drivers in those headphones are physically unable to provide enough detail to show any differences between that and lossless.

[crysin]

Anecdotal, purely in my personal experience I have never once ever had Apple Music crash on any of my devices. This is across multiple generations of MacBooks, iPhone, and including CarPlay. Nor have I ever had it just stop playing music. Strange.