Spotify vs YouTube Music: Which streaming service is better?

Gone are the days when we had to first go through a tedious task of downloading a song, transfer it to a smartphone before listening to it. But, with the rise of internet and smartphones, the demand for music streaming services has also increased giving birth to YouTube Music and Spotify. Both of these music streaming giants were launched in India that bring with itself large collection of songs, curated playlists and offer regional languages support also. Let’s see who wins the Spotify vs YouTube Music competition.

Spotify vs YouTube Music: Price

Spotify is available for free for a period of 30-days. The Spotify Premium India subscription price starts at Rs 119 per month and goes till Rs 1,189 a year. The Sweden-based streaming app also offers top-up packs -- Rs 13 for one day to Rs 719 for six months. If you are a student, you can get a monthly subscription for Rs 59 per month or pay Rs 66 for a one-month top-up.

The YouTube Music is also free of cost but comes with ads. And, if you want the ad-free version, you can opt for YouTube Music Premium which costs Rs 99 per month. The YouTube Premium costs Rs 129 a month.

Spotify vs YouTube Music: Platforms supported

Consumers today are always on the move and no one listens to music on just one device. As they move, their music also moves from smartphones to tablets to desktops. Therefore, the cross-platform functionality is also an important aspect consumers look for while opting a music streaming app.

Spotify gives users the freedom to play it across a wide range of devices and app integrations. Spotify is available as an app on both the iOS and Android devices. There is also an application for Windows, and the streaming service can also be used on PlayStation and Xbox.

YouTube Music is also available as an app on the Android and Apple iOS which makes it usable on a wide range of smartphones and tablets. Unlike Spotify, YouTube Music has no desktop application and no support for PlayStation or Xbox. You need to run a web-based client if you want YouTube music running on desktop.

Spotify vs YouTube Music: Features

Both the streaming services offer an easy to use interface having a three-page layout. The home page on both lists content from trending to playlists, new releases. While the library page on Spotify shows you saved music and podcasts, the YouTube Music library page displays last song played, downloads and playlists. Of the three-page layout, the third page on Spotify allows uses to search, on the other hand YouTube Music’s third page shows trending tracks.

Spotify vs YouTube Music: Content

The Spotify app in India supports multi-language music recommendations which means that the app’s recommendation engine can now be tuned to Hindi, Punjabi, Tamil, and Telugu. Users can fill in their preferred language(s) to receive customised Daily Mix, Home, Radio, and Search results and recommendations. If you are using Spotify for free, you can play every song on demand. Spotify’s music recommendations will also include songs from India’s favourite movies and actors.

YouTube which is already most viewed platform for videos, it’s no surprise that YouTube Music has thousands of playlists, along with the official versions of millions of songs, albums, artist radio. The personalised home screen dynamically adapts to provide recommendations based on people’s listening history, where they are and what they’re doing.

Spotify vs YouTube Music: Summary

Spotify comes as an overall package with cross platform support at its core along with wide library of content to podcasts and radio integration. YouTube Music on the other hand is deeply integrated with its video streaming service allowing access to covers, remixes and originals.

Go for Spotify if you stream music on a multitude of devices, but what makes YouTube Music unique is its ability to play videos along with streaming music.