Announced back in February 2021, Spotify HiFi was supposed to be a new lossless tier launching by the end that year. However, we’ve already well into 2024 and the service has yet to introduce it. But if you are still holding onto the dream of enjoying lossless audio from Spotify, a recent leak is indicating that development for the feature is still alive.
Reddit user OhItsTom has recently shared screenshots of Spotify’s new Lossless option on desktop and mobile, which show a few dialog prompts and system settings related to it. Like most unreleased features on most apps, it appears that some reverse engineering is involved to bring up the feature.
As shown, lossless support on Spotify will come with a compatibility checker, which informs you of the compatibility status of your listening device, your connection, and your bandwidth. Also visible are several advisory panes indicating the ability to listen in Lossless when offline, as well as noting that listening through Bluetooth won’t give users the best experience.
The screenshots reveal that the file streaming quality that you can expect with Lossless can be up to 1,411kbps, which is significantly higher than the existing 320kbps Very High setting. Further, you can go up to 2,117kbps, clocking in as much as 15.9MB per min with Lossless. There’s also mention of 24-bit lossless available on limited songs via FLAC audio format.
The next set (shown above) is supposedly from the feature’s introduction screen on Spotify’s mobile app. The prompts say you can stream wirelessly in “up to 24-bit” on compatible devices through Spotify Connect, while a “Lossless” label will indicate when you are streaming music in that format.
While all of this sounds exciting, there’s still no word on when the music streaming service will actually introduce the much anticipated lossless streaming format. It should also be noted that Spotify was rumoured to introduce an all-new Supremium subscription tier last year to finally include this. However, like HiFi before it, no such rollouts have ever been made.
(Source: Reddit, via Android Authority)
