Apple Music bitrate dependent on connection, new iOS 9 seed due early next week

Apple Music price

Apple Music audio quality depends on whether you’re streaming over Wi-Fi or cellular, Eddy Cue, Appleā€™s Senior Vice President of Internet Software and Services, said on Twitter. In addition, users on iOS 9 Developer Preview will be able to sign up for and use Apple’s music-streaming service ā€œearly next weekā€ when the company is scheduled toĀ seed a new beta of the software to members of itsĀ Apple Developer Program, Cue added.

The executive also responded to a question asking about opting out of Apple Music auto-renewal, saying ā€œyou can turn off auto-renew anytime easily onlineā€. Cody has posted a tutorial on disabling auto-renewal in Apple Music in order to avoid charges after your free trial.

Slashgear reported last month that Apple Music would stream song files at a bitrate of 256kbps. In comparison, Beats Music and Spotify use a 320kbps bitrate.

Unfortunately, Apple Music currently does not allow users to change streaming quality manually on Apple Music even though Betas Music has that option. It would be certainly useful, especially given 4G LTEĀ is often faster than Wi-Fi and for many with unlimited plans usage isn’t a major concern.

Apple has yet to specify Apple Music bitrates for each connection type.

On the other hand, it should be noted that although Spotify uses a higher bit-rate, they’re streaming song files in the MP3 format, as opposed to Apple Music and iTunes Match that use the AAC format which offers better quality at 256kbps than MP3 streaming at 320kbps.

Songs purchased from the iTunes Store are delivered in 256kbps AAC as well.

Spotify offers a 96kbps bitrate on mobile and 160kbps on desktop and web player. The high-quality 320kbps MP3 streaming on mobile and dekstop is only available to Spotify’s Premium subscribers.

Yesterday, Apple issued a new version of iTunes for Mac and Windows PCs alongside the iOS 8.4 software update for the iPhone, iPod touch and iPad with support for Apple Music and Beats 1 radio streaming.

Apple Music is free to try for three months, after which Apple willĀ charge your payment methodĀ on file $9.99 per month for uninterrupted music listening experience with advanced features likeĀ offline playback iCloud Music Library syncing and more.

A $14.99 tier for families up to six is also available.

Come this fall, Apple Music will support Android and the Apple TV.

Speaking of streaming quality, how many of youĀ would be willing to pay more for lossless audio?

Source: Eddy Cue