iA

Spotify vs. Rdio

by Aaron. Average Reading Time: about 2 minutes.

Two different music subscription services, both compelling in their own ways.

Several days ago, Loren Baxter shared something that nudged me about trying Spotify. Despite many other friends signing up through various promotions around their launch, I didn’t. I had used Rdio and have been quite happy with the service.

Still, Loren’s tweets compelled me enough to take notice. Loren is a fantastic UX designer and I respect his insights when he makes such a switch, I tend to want to explore why.
“ It’s done -> switched from Rdio to Spotify.
lorenbaxter
September 14, 2011
“ Rdio’s design is gorgeous, but Spotify has better social integration, more songs, and great local MP3 to phone syncing.
lorenbaxter
September 14, 2011
To which I responded…
“ @lorenbaxter really?
aaronesilvers
September 14, 2011
“ @aaronesilvers really
lorenbaxter
September 14, 2011
“ @lorenbaxter I guess by ‘really’ I mean, collaborative playlists? Better than Rdio?
aaronesilvers
September 14, 2011
“ @aaronesilvers Collaborative playlists, yep :)
lorenbaxter
September 14, 2011
“ @aaronesilvers Give it a try for a month, then decide
lorenbaxter
September 14, 2011
“ @lorenbaxter I guess I will now activate my Spotify account.
aaronesilvers
September 14, 2011
And with that, I activated Spotify. I replicated some playlists I created in Rdio, I integrated my Facebook account and was surprised to see a few friends of mine using Spotify, and some people who are using both Rdio and Spotify.

I observed right away that many friends were making playlists that were entire albums. I didn’t understand why they were doing this, but I use playlists much the way one used to make mixtapes.
After several days of playing with Spotify, though, I’m a little less impressed. I thought I synced my iPhone locally, but yesterday nothing was on my phone when I was on the road and needed my tunes.
Other observations follow…
“ Playing with @rdio and @spotify. Love the Spotify mobile app, but no reviews; no insight into what my friends listen to.
aaronesilvers
September 16, 2011
“ I like the desktop interface for Spotify very much. I like that I can pull in my existing playlists. That stuff is awesome.
aaronesilvers
September 16, 2011
“ With @rdio I can see what my friends are listening to and that is a good opportunity for serendipity. Kinda why I like Turntable.fm
aaronesilvers
September 16, 2011
“ I like Spotify, but I don’t know that I’ll stay pro. I’m already on an unlimited accout for Rdio and I dont know how/why I’d stop yet.
aaronesilvers
September 16, 2011
Why do you use Spotify over Rdio, or vice versa?

 

  • http://www.briandusablon.com Brian Dusablon

    I’m using neither. I never got a Rdio account, and I haven’t used Spotify much. I mostly use star ratings and smart playlists in iTunes. I’d love to spend more time building playlists and collaborating (hell, I never even finished my high school mixtape for Radio Gen1us), but I find most of the time I just want to listen to some tunes, and I have most of the ones I want locally. I am looking forward to iCloud music sync, and hopefully Apple can do better than Ping in the future, or incorporate some social functionalities.

  • http://twitter.com/Juuci Jason F.

    In Regards to the Rdio vs Spotify debate, I’ll admit rdio has great eye candy, and I can spy on my friends taste, find new artist, and great reviews. But…. when it comes down to it I need perfomance, accessibility, and content..Rdio is match. I get the social thing it’s really cool but i just subscribe to my friends play list and add users to my Spotify, I just feel it’s easier to add the eye candy on top of these three main fundamentals:

     Performance:  The web based apps of Mog and Rdio just are not as responsive as the native client both windows, and android. Try skipping to different parts of a song and you’ll see what i mean. Bottom line spotify “feels” like the music is locally stored on your computer, phone vs Rdio. On the android app at least i can “swipe” to the next song instead of having to press that itsy bitsy next button that’s users are limited to on Rdio, try doing this while jogging…I think the point is to have a service that beats the pay per download model..

     Accessibility:  because Spotify uses p2p, songs instantly play even on poor 3g connections, rdio, mog, just does not have this due the way their network and application infastructure is built. This in my opinion is what will be the game changer…to reach critical mass…Content: This maybe subjective I like indie music, Rdio just does not have the same amount of independent artist that Spotify has, and when it comes to finding rare electronic remixes Again Spotify has rdio beat..i guess that’s where 15 millions songs vs 8 or 9 million that rdio has comes in.

    I think web applications,Rdio and Mog though pretty, just have not caught up to the speed and responsiveness of native apps.  Yes social services such as album reviews, tracking friends are nice..but I think using Spotify’s api facebook, twitter and other service will offer better integration for this same type of stuff in the future,,the reality is that mainstream user will be multitasking more and will not want to be tied down to a web interface scrolling away.

    Having spent time with all three services I have to go with Spotify due to it’s interface responsiveness, streaming speed ( network P2P infrastructure), and content selection puts it above the rest and ultimately creates a more commercial application that is more prepared for Critical Mass.,, i.e itunes, sirius radio, mp3 replacement etc..