Spotify is modern day radio. It's fine. But it makes music just blur into the background. It makes you a consumer, not a listener. And after nearly 10 years of using the product, I realised I stopped truly enjoying music the way I used to.
The mix of AI and human-curated playlists is often spot on—my Daylist, for example, is near perfect. It nails the vibe, the time of day, and the general mood I'm in without me having to think. But it’s also soulless. It makes me a passive consumer of music. It just plays in the background, filling the silence, but like I said, I’m not listening—I’m just consuming.
I used to love music. I mean really love it. Ripping CDs, torrenting, spending hours making playlists, carefully deciding what to load onto my iPod. Actively searching for new artists on Hypemachine or music blogs, feeling the excitement of discovery, listening to albums all the way through, and just nerding out on the whole process. Music was something I was involved in. Now it’s just... there.
Spotify is lightyears better than traditional radio. But it still shares that same essence: it’s curated for me, not by me. It tells me what I should listen to; it doesn't encourage engagement and exploration. It’s just good noise. Spotify stops you listening to music. It makes you a consumer of it. Even the idea of listening to a full album, in order, feels so awkward and unnatural in the product. Everything about the UI is geared towards one click to play, and pushing you to listen to what Spotify wants you to listen to.
And the audio quality of Spotify is awful. Like radio, Spotify’s compressed streams are audibly poor. Yes, they announced Spotify HiFi four years ago, but they never delivered. And I can't imagine this coming to life.
So if Spotify is radio, what is Apple Music? IMO it's more like a local record store. And I absolutely love that.
Switching to Apple Music took a bit of adjustment. The playlists aren’t as good—definitely not at Spotify’s level—and the app asks more of you. You have to add albums manually, go looking for things, give it signals, help it learn what you like. You have to be involved with the process.
But once it clicks, it’s incredible.
It’s like going to a record store with a nerdy but brilliant shop owner. You browse a bit, chat about what you like, and over time they start pulling records from behind the counter that you’d never think to try but instantly love. Not playlists. Albums. Whole records. And that’s exactly what I’ve come to love.
Apple Music has made me fall back in love with discovering artists, diving into their discography, and listening—properly listening—to albums from track one all the way through. Artists make albums to take you on this journey, and I get to go on it. Spotify just picks the Instagram moments of the hike. Apple Music gives you the whole experience. And I love it. So, so much!
Apple Music does have playlists, and they’re fine. Nowhere near as polished as Spotify’s, but they serve a different purpose for me now. I mostly pick what I want to listen to, and playlists are there when I just need background music. And honestly, I’ve been really enjoying the "Create Station from Song" feature—it’s such a good way to explore related music once you find a track that really hits.
Plus, lossless audio is incredible. And Dolby Atmos? If you have a surround sound system, please try listening to Apple Music on it at least once. It is such an immersive and enjoyable experience, and TBH it even sounds great on AirPods!
OK, this newsletter is meant to be about Product and Design. So let’s dive into the UX, because there’s a stark difference. And Spotify has truly become the Facebook of audio players.
It's become bloated over the years. Slow, cluttered, and trying to be too many things—music, podcasts, audiobooks—it’s all just noise. And it’s harder than ever to actually find music, especially from artists you like.
I’ve lost count of how many new albums I’ve missed from artists I follow because Spotify buries them under podcast promos or other distractions.
Just compare the landing screens. Spotify’s is clearly optimised for retention and listening time—pushing the most clickable options at you. Apple Music, on the other hand, feels like it was designed by people who love music. It’s clean, it surfaces albums and playlists, it highlights new releases in a simple, tasteful way.
That said, Apple Music has its flaws. Playlist management is a big one. I miss having folders for playlists like I did on Spotify. Apple Music can get unruly fast without it.
Also, the Now Playing screens on Apple Music are just so, so nice. Some albums have amazing animations, others just let the album art shine. It's just clean AF.
The animations and flow through the products just feel so different as well. Spotify is slow, janky, and it feels more like a React Native app than a true native one. Whereas the animations and interactions in Apple Music feel crispy, snappy, and delightful. You can really see the craft of the eng team come through here.
Now, the desktop apps. Spotify has built an absolute monstrosity here. They've built something that feels more like Facebook than a music app. Endless panels, weird promos, visual noise, and a complete lack of attentiveness to information density. It's wild the product has got to where it is now, especially considering where it came from. Using the product sucks. It's slow, frustrating, and just so laborious to get to what you want.
Compared to the above, Apple Music is a breath of fresh air. The typography is borderline perfect, the information density near impeccable, and the landing experience is outstanding. It puts you where you want, helps you to find what you're looking for, and puts music (albums especially!) front and centre.
Plus, I love how they disperse playlists and albums together, encouraging ways to discover and enjoy music. They categorise things in logical themes, allowing you to find music no matter your mood. And the tab dedicated to New Music is so, so great as well. You'll truly discover albums, artists, playlists, and even interviews that you'll genuinely enjoy.
The one area they really need to improve is playlist management. I have no idea why they don't have containers/folders yet. But once they do, the app will feel near perfect.
Overall, the biggest difference is what you want music to be to you. If you just want to have music in the background, played through cheap headphones or speakers, Spotify is probably still for you. But if you want to love music—if you enjoy discovering artists, albums, and songs, manually adding them to your library and then delighting when the app suggests new things for you—and you truly want to listen and enjoy music, in high quality, with a beautiful UI. Apple Music is for you.
Go to the digital record store of Apple Music and enjoy the experience. Trust me. It's way, way better than the crackly background radio that Spotify has sadly become.
I recently just went back to Apple Music. It truely is a delight and making playlists again is fun again. I also took the time to move over some of my favorite curiatied Spotify playlists. Had to do it manually but it was worth the hour of my time.
FYI, they do have folders but only on the Mac app and they work on iOS once you create them on the Mac. Strange they don't let you create folder on iOS but typical Apple.
An underrated feature of apple music is their radio stations too. Actual DJs playing music. Shows hosted by artists. Long form interviews. You can just turn it on and let it play and who knows what you’ll hear.