Music streaming service Tidal is changing its subscriptions. The HiFi subscription with a bitrate of up to 1411Kbit/s now costs 10 euros per month. ‘Innovative audio formats’ up to 9216Kbit/s are reserved for the HiFi Plus subscription, which costs 20 euros per month.
Previously, Tidal’s offer consisted of a Premium subscription of 10 euros per month with music with a bitrate up to 320Kbit/s and a HiFi subscription of 20 euros per month with higher bit rates and special formats such as Master Quality Audio. With the new cheaper HiFi subscription, that MQA format is no longer available. Dolby Atmos and Sony 360 Reality Audio are now only available via the HiFi Plus subscription.
Users of the old Premium subscription will be transferred to the HiFi subscription, which will cost the same. A free version of Tidal will also be available in the United States, The Verge writes, but it is not available in other countries. With the free version, users do not get ‘HiFi’ sound quality, but a maximum bitrate of 160Kbit/s.
New Tidal Subscriptions
Tidal also says it will reward artists differently. This is done on the basis of the listening behavior of Tidal HiFi Plus subscribers. A percentage of the revenue from those subscriptions goes to the artists that subscribers listen to the most. Subscribers can see for themselves in their account which artist that is. The artists receive this income in addition to the royalties they receive for streaming their music.
Next year, Tidal will also change those royalties. The service calls this fan-centered royalties and says it will pay artists based on the actual streaming activity of individual HiFi Plus subscribers. According to Tidal, that’s different from the “industry-accepted method of aggregating streams.” Tidal claims that this allows users to play a greater role in the success of their favorite artists.
Tidal comes with the changes after other streaming services have also made adjustments to their subscriptions. Apple Music got support for lossless audio at no extra cost this year. Amazon Music subsequently removed the additional cost for lossless audio. Spotify said in February that there will be a HiFi subscription for lossless music this year, but that is not yet available.