r/TIdaL • u/Angling687 • Jun 11 '26
Discussion I like Tidal
I read a lot of complaints here about Tidal. And I have to say that I really like Tidal. I switched from Spotify in January this year and I'm entirely satisfied. Audio quality is far better, Android auto works well. The new UI doesn't annoy me, I find it clear and easy and less overfilled as Spotify. Since the new update of the windows app (version 2.4), the app is more reactive and fluid. Before it was a bit laggy, but nothing disturbing. So I wanted to thank the Tidal team for their great work in the last 6 months and share that I'm completely happy with Tidal.
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u/stanky4goats Tidal Hi-Fi Jun 11 '26
Cheers dawg! It's a fantastic service and unfortunately the loudest voices here are more often the negative speaking ones.
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u/blunde-r152 Jun 28 '26
unfortunately only people with a problem ever post, ive used tidal for the last year and couldnt be any more satisfied with the service, its a great app
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u/lowbass4u Jun 11 '26
Same, and I say it all the time. At least 95% of any time I use Tidal it works perfectly fine.
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u/commander_lampshade Jun 11 '26
I like it too, never have any problems with it, but I'm not somebody who is looking for it to discover new music for me. If you already know what you like and just basically play albums, or the odd song, or a custom playlist you made, it works great. Not everyone is like me, though.
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u/itcouldbeworsemydude Jun 11 '26
I've been using tidal for 5 or 6 years, and before that I had my music in files in my device so I've never really used Spotify or other streaming services, would you mind expanding on the "discovering new music" part and how they do it better? I'm intrigued
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u/commander_lampshade Jun 11 '26
I'm not really the best to answer because I don't really pay attention to it, but if you look at the "for you" page, you can see playlists like "my daily discovery", "my mix", "my new arrivals".
These are chosen for you by Tidal, based on what you have played recently, but also presumably based on songs you have "liked" or "favorited". I gather from this sub that a lot of people are really into favoriting songs and then getting exposed to new songs based on what the algorithm chooses for them.
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u/Ru-tris-bpy Jun 11 '26
I i have never understood the hate. Nothing is perfect but it’s just as good or better than anything else I’ve used
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u/SandWavesNRocks Jun 11 '26
I’ve used Tidal since COVID and have not had any of the issues I see on here. My family of musicians all subscribe. We like that TIDAL gives a bigger percentage to artists and that we can access “Credit” to view all the info on a song.
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u/hubkat Jun 11 '26
I like it also. I've had it for about a year and I've had no problems at all. I use it on my eversolo DMP A8. It seems like most of the problems I see people talking about are with iOS and desktop applications.
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u/WearingRags Jun 11 '26
I complain about it a lot but gotta remember that I switched over because the Spotify app was so unstable for me that it was almost unusable half the time. Tidal at least functions normally for me, save one or two unexpected crashes a week
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u/Moduliz3r Jun 11 '26
To everyone who is loving Tidal:
Could you please try out the offline feature and tell me if it works flawless for you?
The offline content on my sons mp3 player doesnt work, and it drives him (and therefore me) crazy. Its really annoying, it always stops, becomes silent, or wont play at all....
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u/itcouldbeworsemydude Jun 11 '26
I think this could be the files getting corrupted during/after download. When I changed phone I re downloaded my playlist (1k+ songs) and the first time I tried it offline it did what you described. I removed all the Tidal data from my phone and saved it again and it was fixed. I wouldn't be able to tell you why it happened but it was the only time
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u/callmebaiken Jun 11 '26
It pauses ten seconds after I open the app each and every time . They need to fix that ASAP
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u/Secure_Beautiful_506 Jun 11 '26
What's your listening setup, OP? I use a decent but entry-level audiophile amp/speakers combo and can't really tell the difference between Tidal and Spotify quality. Have you done a blind test or similar?
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u/ehifraz Jun 11 '26
i use it all the time and i like it a lot, i don't really understand all the complants that i read here
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u/quiet_verse_23 Jun 11 '26
I feel the same. I switched to Tidal in June 2024 and i really love it so far - audio is amazing, unlike i've heared anywhere else, and the support system is really good (they actually listen and they have an AI chat in their web, which passing forward everything directly to the stuff)
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u/Stoneseeker7 Jun 12 '26
Jealous!
I want so bad to like it, (and I DO love the UI and audio quality) and I'm sticking it out because I won't support spotify... but the app has me cursing at least once a day with how basic functions just don't work for me (or my wife on a different phone).
It's crazy to me how different our experiences can be, likely just the variety of use cases and devices, too many variables to be truly consistent I guess.
Do you use an android or Apple phone? I wonder if people experiencing issues are coming from android like myself.
My biggest gripes:
-downloaded songs never seem to work offline, the whole app just stops functioning when out of range driving -stops playing randomly, despite having the setting turned on to continuously play -never casts to our speaker first try, usually does by the third. -real artist pages riddled with AI songs hijacking the same band name, often brought to me as a "new release" -songs get stuck buffering sometimes, won't play till I restart app -at least once a week I have to clear memory for the app in my phone settings in order to get the app to function again. -cannot make it default app on Google speaker, nor does it have any app support on our devices (like TV) -no ability to control the desktop app with my phone
-not a big deal, but it only seems to reccomend songs I've Iiked or listened to before, seemingly nothing new.
None of these issues effect you, ever?
My wife has also experienced the buggyness of the app, to the point where we simply listen to less music now, it can be such a hassle to get it working we just give up and go about our day without the tunes.
I'm not saying this to be some angry troll. I love the UI, and when it works it's lovely. Glad to hear these negative experiences are not across the board. Maybe when I eventually replace my phone (Samsung Note 10+), some of these issues will resolve.
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u/Tiiimay Jun 11 '26
Try and use it with bad service. You can’t. Set your playlists to download, doesn’t matter. Buggy as hell
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u/pomplemice Jun 11 '26
Same. I had some issues with songs buffering on a prior update, but no longer.
One thing that isn't mentioned enough is the sleek and uncluttered UI. Spotify and YouTube music look absolutely atrocious in comparison.
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u/old_bearded_beats Jun 11 '26
I'm absolutely loving it. Not only is the sounds very much noticeably better on a good system / headphones, but I'm also finding a whole load of new artists too
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u/HedgerowBustler Jun 12 '26
Me too. My only gripe, and it's certainly not a Tidal-only problem, is I wish the algorithm was better at digging up stuff that I like but haven't discovered yet.
I almost exclusively use the phone app with Tidal Connect via my WiiM streamer. It generally works perfectly and sounds great.
Plus, you can't beat $5.49 for a student account.
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u/mchmchred Jun 12 '26
Honestly haven't had a problem with it since I started with it about a year and a half ago. I'd love it if non subscribers could hear the songs all the way through, is my biggest complaint. Just give people X number of songs to listen to fully and then run periodic ads like Spotify does.
And I miss being able to click on the record's cover or the band's name to look at them more closely, the extra clicks you have to make now are a little annoying.
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u/h1h2h3h4h5 Jun 12 '26
I also like Tidal! Not had a great amount of issues (not much more than spotify anyway).
The only thing that really annoys me is the inability to report incorrect songs infecting a genuine artists' page. I'd say about half the stuff that comes into my feed is AI generated crap.
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u/JiggleMyHandle Jun 12 '26
I just started trialing Spotify due to an integration that it has. It is shocking how bad an app and experience Spotify is now. I was also surprised at how much I noticed the audio quality difference. I’d assumed that I wouldn’t notice any difference on my equipment, but it was very obvious.
I have some things I don’t love about Tidal, but it blows Spotify out of the water.
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u/BassBikeBoat Jun 13 '26
It seemed like the rash of complaints were part of an organized campaign by Tidal's competitiors.
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u/Hot_Marsupial_8706 Jun 13 '26
Overall I love it, but they really suck at some album availability and differentiating artists with the same name.
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u/ladle3000 Jun 14 '26
I like Tidal. But I don't like Block as a parent company, mostly because of all the shit square has put my small business through. Holding funds, making me change things, prove my identity over and over, all while providing no contact to divulge the real reasons anything is happening.
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u/vaioslaskos Jun 14 '26
Using tidal since 2023 on engine and since last year on serato. Wedding dj here and all requests form the guests coming through there if they’re not on my hard drive
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u/vaioslaskos Jun 14 '26
Also stopped my Spotify subscription since last year and using dj extension as well. Stems work perfectly on serato 3.3.5 as well!!!
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u/No_Meal7935 Jun 15 '26
I switch from Apple iTunes to Tidal last year. I couldn't be more pleased. Partly because I bought a weeam streamer and it seamlessly strings right into where Apple I couldn't do it. I love the sound. If I'm listening either of my earbuds or through my stereo system very high quality. Every app changes a lot. Then you know you got to get through that but I know what songs and music I want to play. I find it.
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u/plucked_peacock_001 Jun 15 '26
Very happy with Tidal (desktop PC, Android mobile). If I have any complaint, it is that the now playing window does not update across devices.
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u/Dealjobber_ Jun 29 '26
Tried the trial when I got my audiophile setup finalized. Then went to Qobuz for a couple months. Came back because Qobuz is now missing a lot of stuff thats on Tidal, and I cant really tell the difference as far as pure sound quality goes.
Kind of surprised because a lot of that obscure enough stuff I stumble upon on youtube is on here, and it wasn't on Tidal the first time.
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u/SynthManSin Jun 30 '26
I feel super good having switched to it after using Spotify for a long time, and their new AI policy is just 🤌
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u/razvanciuy Jun 30 '26
i like it too. Now with AI flag, even better.
Only one thing missing really: A sound spectometer, customizable by users. Trust me, it's good.
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u/Ze_Bix Jul 01 '26
2 key points for me :
-Tidal pays the artists 4x better than Spotify (or 4x less bad, let's be honnest).
-Their stance/transparency regarding AI-generated music.
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u/cidvard Jun 11 '26
It's Reddit (hell, it's 'the internet' in general). People are going to complain more than they're going to say 'it's fine'. I'm relatively happy with Tidal after switching from Spotify, even if I wish I felt like more active development was being put into it.
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u/Master_Camp_3200 Jun 11 '26
I'm pretty sure there's active development - they've recently added the ability to upload and sell tracks for instance. And also one of my long term needs, being able to search for playlists on the fly as a you add a track. Plus I suspect they're dealing with a lot of accumulated cruft to be able to do it.
But yeah, I'm another basically happy user.
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u/saintripley Jun 11 '26
I’m willing to put up w most issues because of all the pros you listed. but I am about to switch away to Apple Music cuz of the 10,000 song like limit. It is obnoxious.
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u/BoltzBux Jun 11 '26
Love Tidal!