Everything Qobuz has is at a minimum 16/44. I’ve seen some stuff on Tidal that is only AAC with no FLAC copy available. I tried Tidal for a few days and am back with Qobuz. As another person said they also really push Hip Hop/Rap even though I’ve never listened to that.
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There probably would not be much, if any, SQ difference between the two, and Tidal will definitely not be any better (unless you want that Atmos thing). For my personal taste, Q also has more of the music I care to listen to (although not everything), but even more importantly I would not give a red cent to the people involved with Tidal, while Qobuz appears to be unobjectionable, so it was an easy decision for me…
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I’ve been doing a 30 day trial of Tidal and have done some comparisons. Tidal does have some albums that are missing from Qobuz, but I’ve also found some albums Qobuz has that Tidal doesn’t.
But it’s the hires selection that has me choosing Qobuz over Tidal with about the same library, Qobuz has more than twice as many hires albums 96k and higher in my library. I also found over 1200 MQA 44k only albums in my Tidal library. That means there was no standard CD or hires version available yet. And I actually found 50 AAC albums still in Tidal. That’s lossy format they never updated. So for less money, Qobuz is a better value and the few albums that I found missing on Tidal weren’t worth the trade off of less hires content and dealing with remaining MQA.
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EDIT: <redacted>, this whole part of my post was wrong.
I like Qobuz. I like Sublime. I like the magazine. I like David and the US crew. I’ll keep my Qobuz. (even if I can’t listen to the above recording)
You can tell the people who run Qobuz really care about music. The people who run Tidal seem to care more about money.
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I currently have both - Qobuz only became available here in Canada in May. There is nothing to choose between them in terms of SQ through Roon, although Tidal Connect is a bonus feature that I occasionally use. I find the weekly new releases section in Tidal far better than in Qobuz - having used it for several years, it has learnt my preferences somewhat, so whilst there is still quite a bit of rap and hip-hop etc. I get many good recommendations that way. The search functions are equally frustrating, for different reasons, and the Qobuz catalogue is missing a few of my Tidal favourites (but never the other way around).
The only couple of reasons I still have Qobuz are for the PDF booklets for a reasonable number of more recent (mainly) classical releases, and for the discount hi-res purchases (again, not all albums are available to buy this way, but I will save the cost of my subscription). Will be interesting to see what, if any, moves there are on price. I suspect Qobuz may increase theirs in time, rather than Tidal decreasing theirs. Regardless, even at twice the price it would be a bargain, and it is amazing to have so much music available in two different but excellent products that are so seamlessly integrated into Roon.
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You’d think they would have made some, then…
But whatever it is Dorsey or Jay-Z care about, they aren’t getting any of my money…
Jay-Z sold his majority share a couple of years ago, but is still the second largest shareholder along with Beyoncé, Madonna and Rihanna. Arcade Fire, Calvin Harris, Coldplay, Daft Punk, Deadmau5, Jack White, Jason Aldean, J Cole, Kanye West, Nicki Minaj, and Usher were also involved.
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Those are 14 people I never listen to, and one I’ve never heard of.
Qobuz for the win.
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Then you’re missing out on some cracking music.
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I never suggested that I haven’t heard their music.
I have. That’s why I don’t listen to it.
T’each his own.
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Seems to me that the music they make is irrelevant to the question whether they might make good stewards of Tidal looking after musicians.
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De gustibus non est disputandum
But I would not listen to any of them even if you gave me Roon lifetime license cost for it.
I have had both Tidal and Qobuz for the past little while … Tidal’s ‘Mixes for you’ playlists are very good. Qobuz’s playlists are not as good (for me). Tidal’s ‘base’ suggestions are mainly hiphop/rap which I am not into but I can ignore that. I think now that the MQA/FLAC thing has been sorted out with Tidal I will let my Qobuz subscription lapse. The other thing I discovered is that with my university email account I can get the student rate for Tidal which is a substantial discount from the rack rate.
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That is true, Henry, Qobuz search engine doesn’t always come up with the result you want. It’s annoying.
Qobuz have a fixed price for all their music (incl up to 192/24). With Tidal you have this plan-feature that I don’t like, and you pay extra for HiRes. If you are OK with 44.1/16 (CD sound) you should stay with Tidal and save the $5 extra charge.
It depends where you live. Here in Brasil the top Tidal tier is the equivalent of US$6.80 a month and Qobuz $5.80.
This is a reason to have both. best of both worlds?!
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I have Tidal HiFi and Qobuz. For albums that are only available in 48/24, Tidal obviously has downsampled 44/16 versions already in its database to deliver to HiFi only subscribers. Did they provide any information about their downsampling process? IIRC, Qobuz uses dBpoweramp to downsample albums like this when they sell the 44/16 version. Are the savings in bandwidth that large for Tidal to just not deliver 48/24 as is? These albums are labeled just lossless in Apple Music. Not that I can hear the difference. I’m just curious to know. Thanks!
I have been subscribing to a lot of services over the last couple of years. Spotify, Apple Music. Amazon Music, Qobuz, Tidal and Deezer.
Of these services I liked Qobuz, Tidal and Deezer the most.
I have been subscribed to Qobuz for nearly 3 years now and recently upgraded to Sublime. I haven’t bought albums in years but the last few weeks I’ve bought several in CD or hi-res format with nice discounts and they sound perfect with Roon in my living room.
Tidal has been an on and off affair. I loved the Qobuz/Tidal combination when it comes to their integration with Roon. But after the MQA vs FLAC wars and its high subscription cost I have decided to let Tidal lapse again. It expired last week but I did get to test Roon with hi-res FLAC and that did work nicely.
Next to Qobuz Sublime I am subscribed to Deezer. Both on annual plans. Deezer only has Redbox CD quality. Sadly no Roon integration. Deezer has music that Qobuz doesn’t. Although Qobuz has about 98% of my favorite music.
I love listening to Deezer at work. Their Flow option is really great.
When it comes to subscription costs. Tidal HiFi Plus costs about the same as Qobuz Studio and Deezer combined. Tidal monthly and Qobuz/Deezer annually. Now of course since upgrading to Qobuz Sublime there is now a difference but it is worth it for me.
So Qobuz and Deezer is what I have finally settled on.
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I had both for a while when Qobuz first came available in Canada. I wanted to like Qobuz because I waited a long time to use it. The reason I chose tidal in the end was for its offline iOS mode. It works far better for me when I’m cycling and have no cell service. I found Qobuz really frustrating without cell or wifi.
My two cents…
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