Remember 2021? South Africa was still in lockdown; we were an entire Fast and Furious movie behind and Spotify said that it would add HiFi audio to its platform before the year had ended. Two years on, and Spotify’s ‘HiFi’ audio is nowhere to be seen. Unless you’re looking at Apple Music or Tidal, both of which have since added lossless streaming to their platforms at no extra charge.
“Supremium”, really?
Fortunately, Spotify’s own take on lossless streaming might finally be on the way, according to a Bloomberg report. A little later than expected, sure, but on the way all the same. There’s just one teeny little problem. According to the report, Spotify is planning to roll the product out as a part of a new, more expensive subscription, internally dubbed “Supremium,” with the streamer planning a rollout to non-US markets later this year, and an official US launch in October.
As dumb as the name sounds, there could be a beacon of hope to cling to here. In October last year, a Redditor received a Spotify survey that hinted at a more expensive $20/m (roughly R360/m) tier that included HiFi audio, along with access to the streamer’s audiobook selection. If you ask us, that sounds mighty like the ‘Supremium’ tier Spotify is apparently working on and would explain Spotify’s decision to charge extra for the service. As it stands, Spotify only allows users to purchase from its library of audiobooks.
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There are rumours too, that the streaming giant could augment its current ‘Premium’ tier with access to audiobooks – either by allowing subscribers a set number of hours to access the content, or a specific number of titles per month. Whether the new and more expensive tier would include unlimited access to audiobooks or not, remains to be seen.
Whatever the case turns out to be with the streamer’s new tier, we’re just hoping for a name change. ‘Superemium’? Seriously? If you’re desperate, just throw a ‘Plus’ onto the end of your ‘Premium’ plan. Heck, we won’t even charge for that idea. It’s all yours.