For Apple Music Android app customers, the spatial and lossless audio capabilities have begun to roll out. However, there is a catch: it is only available in the beta version.
Apple began rolling out the two new capabilities to its Apple Songs iOS app last week, and now the spatial and lossless audio quality categories are streaming a wide range of music. However, the new capabilities will only be available on iPhone, iPad, and Mac. Additionally, some AirPods and Beat earbuds are compatible with the newly added functionality.
Apple made no mention of the launch of spatial and lossless audio features for Apple Music Android during the presentation. However, it appears that the business has begun to distribute the update to Android apps as well. Let’s take a closer look at the most recent developments.
Other improvements include the addition of Crossfade, which begins playing a new track as soon as the previous one finishes. It allows you to mix and match the ending and beginning tunes of two different songs. There are also some improvements to the music library’s search capabilities. Apple Music also shows you how much data each file category uses on average.
These new capabilities are only available to beta customers who have signed up for the Play Store’s beta channel, and they have not yet been sent out to stable customers. It should be available on all devices soon.
You’ll be able to listen to Spatial listening “on compatible devices” once you’ve updated, with Apple advertising “thousands of tracks in Dolby Atmos accessible at launch.” The company has put together a playlist of available songs, and you can check for the “Dolby Atmos” label immediately above the tracklist on an album page.
You can also check for “Lossless.” In Settings, there is a new “Audio Quality” menu to enable “Lossless Audio.” Preference let you choose between the different tiers and where it applies (Cellular, Wi-Fi Streaming, or Downloads):
- High Efficiency: AAC with low data usage [Cellular only]
- High Quality: AAC 256 kbps
- Lossless: ALAC up to 24-bit/48 kHz
- High-Resolution Lossless: ALAC up to 24-bit/192 kHz
Lossless audio files keep every element of the original file, however, enabling the option uses a lot more storage. For example, a 10GB hard drive should hold roughly 3,000 high-quality tracks, 1,000 lossless tracks, and just 200 hi-res lossless tracks.
Users must sign up for the beta channel in the Play Store to obtain access to this version, but the fact that they are included suggests that the larger Apple Music user base on Android won’t have to wait long to gain these capabilities as well. It would be interesting to see when the tech giant is going to roll out the stable version of the new Apple Music update for the Android platform.
To fully discriminate between conventional and lossless audio, you’ll need some rather high-end connected hardware. We recommend a pair of connected headphones with a decent DAC for the best experience, as Bluetooth headphones will not be able to stream in lossless. Bluetooth headphones, on the other hand, can be used to listen to Dolby Atmos Spatial Audio.
