TIDAL Music: HiFi Sound Reviews

by Jmarcus

I started selling high end audio equipment back in the 90s, to me the popularity signaled the end of the high end audio Industry and the backlash of consumers against record companies for producing and supporting music distribution mediums that wore out, or scratched easily. I should have known better that people would help move file based music into the hi-fi so many of us cling too. Supported by this trend, I signed up for Tidal with a hi-fi account. The sound quality does come through, and my Oppo application usually works with Tidal, that about where my satisfaction with Tidal ends. First UX, what year is it? Offline sorting, display of albums, vs artist and general navigation smack of early 2000s expect the availability of modern program languages reveal either the incompetence of Tidal’s product team or they have outsourced their UX to a bank. Customer support is impossible to contact. The last time I tried, their wasn’t any authentication between TIDALMusic my account and their ticketing system, so each time I wrote a ticket and submitted it, I got a message saying I wasn’t authorized. I unsuccessfully emailed and took to Twitter, none of the channels replied. What a dismal and useless waste of money. I consider this a major management failure. Good luck, when you are selling for pennies on the dollar refer to this review. Make your customers happy and they won’t have to lower their gaze when people ask why they are using Tidal in public.

by Arby57

I like hi quality sound having grownup with vinyl as basically the only form of recorded music. That said, I find it hard to conceptualize how HiFi, being analog by nature, can be completely reproduced in a digital environment. That said, I thought I would give it a try and might have even heard a little difference but for the $25 per month I am not sure it is worth it. Considering that is more money monthly than 2 HD video streaming services and considering that TIDAL doesn’t seem to interface well nor does it feel very intuitive. But, here is my biggest pet peeve; I contacted them for service and found no phone support! Twenty-five dollars per month and no phone support! Outrageous! Worse, I emailed them and 3 days later they responded and so it went. Two weeks later they had not even figured out my account. I am not used to being treated like that especially for $300 per year. If we are going to pay that kind of money for music streaming service they should be prepared to treat us like royalty. HD music from Apple and Pandora sounds good to me and while some may be saying I don’t have an ear, I studied voice with one of the top coaches in the country with gold records on his wall from a number of his students and my father was one of jazz’s greats. I am willing to pay for what I get if it’s worth it but I ain’t paying for a limo and riding the bus!

by Ogan040506

TIDALMusic constantly has performance issues. I want to like TIDAL because it pays artists better than most streaming services but TIDALMusic is consistently terrible. Currently it has just deleted all of my liked songs and upon redownloading TIDALMusic it also deleted all of my playlists. TIDALMusic also tends to pick favorites out of your liked songs and play them several times a week over other songs. There is no rhyme or reason to why these songs are played more they just are and it’s incredibly annoying. The search function will also only pull up songs from smaller artists if the song title and artist name are searched for and spelled exactly right and before you finish typing it will show “no results” so until you type everything out exactly right there is no chance it will pull up what you are looking for. TIDALMusic is also very slow to load. If you click from search to liked songs expect to wait 10-20 seconds minimum for tidal to load so you can scroll through the liked songs area again. Terrible app. I really want to like TIDALMusic but I simply can’t recommend it. As soon as I am able to get my songs back I will be canceling my subscription and moving to Apple Music.

by Banes

I listen mainly on my iPhone XS Max and I really enjoy listening to high quality music. I just ended a trial subscription to Deezer HiFi and wanted to try Tidal.

Interface is ok, I don't really like how the option to cast to my Google Cast enabled devices is not on the top right corner like nearly every other app that is cast-enabled. But my biggest gripe is that when I do switch from casting back to audio on my phone, the audio quality is deplorable. I listened to the same track - Out of Love by Alessia Cara - on Tidal (where it is a "Master Track") then Google Play Music (on the highest audio quality) and Tidal sounded so awful, mainly on the high end. Low end notes were decently clear and punctuate, but man when those mids and trebles come in - it sounds atrocious. The only way I've been able to resolve it is if I uninstall TIDALMusic and reinstalled it. I cast my music to my speakers every morning when I get ready for the day and I don't want to have to uninstall and install TIDALMusic every single day. I'm definitely not going to continue my subscription (especially at $26/month) if this problem cannot be resolved.

by 1483794583655

Each update that changes the user interface/design is usually for the worse. I’ve been able to get used to the changes until recently. 95% of my time on TIDALMusic is spent in the download albums page which used to look very nice and clean. The background of TIDALMusic was a sleek black and the downloaded albums page was very minimalist and asthetically pleasing. Now the background is an outdated dark grey and the album covers got a lot smaller (making the unused space more noticeable). It seems they were trying to make room for the year the album was published and whether the album is explicit or mastered. This is information that you don’t need when looking through albums you’ve downloaded to your personal collection and are already familiar with. Things like that have always been contained in the info tab of albums once you click on them and that worked great to keep it out of the way. Also the album artworks jolt when you press them which I can only describe as a cheap feeling animation that isnt all that responsive in the first place.

In summary, I’m really disappointed with the way the interface looks now and when I scroll through my albums - I’m not nearly as excited to use or return to TIDALMusic . Please consider making the UI sleek like it used to be.

by Tjovian

I’ve been using iTunes and Apple Music solely for 15 years and I’ve stayed locked into the ecosystem because it was convenient and familiar, but after I was given a turn-table as a gift a year ago I rediscovered the beauty of vinyl. I began to record my vinyls as lossless files you listen to on the go in the VOX app, but TIDALMusic is terribly buggy, crashes often, and after a recent update keeps nagging me to buy a premium subscription to play music I already own, which is just ridiculous. I decided that if I had to pay subscription fees, I’d be better off looking for a service that could save me the hassle of having to record my vinyls, encode, split, tag, and transfer to my mobile devices and was deciding between trying Tidal and Qobuz, but wound up picking Tidal due to the reviews I read and the price point (HiFi access with student pricing for $5?!?, I couldn’t sign up fast enough). I still have Apple Music so I can listen to audio using just my cellular Apple Watch when I’m mowing the lawn or out kayaking, but the 2 hours a day I spend commuting is more luxurious now that I’m able to easily play hi-res audio on my Harman Kardon system in my car.

by D Money Tha Don

I love the streaming quality of Tidal but there are some annoying glitches. 1) The Apple CarPlay integration (this is an opinion not a bug) does not allow for the adding of songs while you drive unless you unlock you phone and manually add the song to your library. That’s a driving hazard for those who can’t wait until the next stop to save the song. 2) There is a new bug where my music will stop playing in the middle of a song without reason or warning. 3) When you add an album, the album gets added to the “Albums” section of TIDALMusic but the individual songs do not get added to your library. I HATE this because I have go manually add everything from an album to the individual song library too which takes additional time.

Overall, if you’re looking to stream with quality sound, this is TIDALMusic for you. If you want convenience and a flawless listening experience, stick to Apple Music until Tidal works out the kinks (and I know they will). Or, you could be like me and just have both.

by Carode

The master quality recordings sound noticeably better. The selection of music is pretty impressive. I use it most of the time on my phone in my car via a Bluetooth device called Tune2Air, but also on my iPad with a Bluetooth speaker at home. The UI/UX of TIDALMusic itself leaves lots to be desired. It often doesn’t remember where you left off on a playlist—either starts from the top or it replays songs you already heard the last time you listened. It does nor retain whether you had a playlist on shuffle or not, or at least it doesn’t keep shuffling if that’s what you were using. It’s not easy to create playlists, not intuitive—far too many taps and you can only add one song at a time. Yeah, that’s right, it’s a a music app that makes it unpleasant to create playlists. I’ve also done searches for an exact song name, spelled it right, and it says “no results.” Then I search instead for the artist and I find the song. Weird. I recommend you hire some peeps to develop your app properly, Tidal. The quality of your app is nowhere near the quality of the content you offer. But it should be. Frustrating.

by Princessdj3

I love using Tidal, I’ve been using it for the past two years now. But honestly the glitches that happen with TIDALMusic sometimes makes me considering switching to a different streaming service. 1. This is one of the biggest issues I’ve experienced (at least 3-4 times thus far), where sometimes Tidal works, and other times it wipes out like HALF of my track library. This happened to me again today, and signing out and back in a few times seemed to help me before, but the fact that this happens at all really needs to be addressed and looked into. 2. Sometimes TIDALMusic takes forever to load tracks, if at all. Every day I’m closing TIDALMusic and reopening it in order for something to load. 3. Sometimes as tracks are playing, it stops in the middle of a queue, and if I open TIDALMusic , it’ll just force close. again I love using Tidal, I love that artists are getting paid what they deserve, but at some point these glitches are going to be a turn off a lot of subscribers, like myself, causing people to go elsewhere for their music. Please help!

by Greenis6

almost at the end of my free trial. PLEASE add an apple watch app. I hate having to carry my iphone with me when I workout just to listen to music, due to your lack of an app for the apple watch. Also, when connected to car bluetooth, TIDALMusic glitches. when I leave the car, the music will pause. but when I get back in the car, it will not automatically start playing again. it makes me manually force close TIDALMusic on my iphone and go back into the tidal app to resume playing (this also restarts the song i was playing, and sometimes the whole playlist. very annoying). i didn’t have this issue with apple music. I get “error loading this content” when trying to load my playlists through apple carplay, which, again, forces me to manually pull out my phone and do it from there. hopefully tidal reads this review and fixes these issues, as this would truly perfect TIDALMusic and I would leave 5 stars. the sound quality is amazing, music definitely sounds the way the artist intended. the layout takes a little getting use to if you’re use to apple music, but I actually now prefer the layout of tidal. i love the tidal mixes and the different stations that they have available. it could be a perfect app if they fix these issues. not sure if i’ll be continuing to use it after my free trial ends, the lack of an apple watch app and the glitches that I put up with on daily basis (the ones I listed earlier) are a big turn off for me.

by _StarQuality

I’m not an expert in audio so I honestly didn’t have any expectations that I would notice any difference between NORMAL quality and the MASTER, but I have to say I was blown away. The master quality is superb, songs I’ve listened to hundreds of times completely transform, and all the details, layered sound, and 3 dimensional effect take the music to elevated level of intimacy. I appreciate Tidal for providing a studio quality experience.

However, I really wish that lyrics where available in TIDALMusic I think any true music platform should have a lyrics feature. Also, since such a large portion of tidal subscribers use Apple devices it would be nice if there were Siri integration and Apple Watch compatibility for TIDALMusic. I want nothing more to be able to ask Siri to play my “morning drive” playlist in the tidal app. And I wish I could leave my phone in the house to go for a morning jog and still be able to stream my favorite songs on tidal on my Watch. The Apple Watch has come so far and I use to make calls, check the news, and stream my favorite podcasts why can’t I browse thru my tidal music selection from my watch ?

by Ing

Ok, Tidal gets a lot right... sounds great, especially the MQA stuff ... closest to analog I’ve heard thus far (HiFi tier only)... I’d give their service 4 stars, it’s TIDALMusic I give 3...TIDALMusic misses because there’s no easy way to search when you are in offline mode, which is a must do when trying to make sure you don’t waste data downloading hi-res files! Need shuffle within artist, better playlist controls... maybe even a toggle for making sure it only downloads over WiFi? I don’t know, I like Tidal a lot, especially after my iTunes library was messed up due to its inherently flawed “matching” system... obviously there is no matching abilities with Tidal at all, the draw for me is having a separate rental app and having my iTunes library synced from my Mac Pro without “matching” deciding to match random tracks with different masters from the album a track is originally from or screwing up my cover art... anyway, the MQA and full resolution downloads make Tidal is very very realistic and tempting alternative for the long haul for music rental. Wish the desktop version allowed downloads for offline listening too... Random missing albums are an issue too... why certain albums aren’t available is odd especially if an artist is on Tidal and the album isn’t that old...

by Scudman

I just purchased a new stereo system and the first thing I wanted to do was upgrade the music sources since MP3 was not cutting it for me anymore. With a pair of B&W 702s and a new Denon AVR-4500H, is wasn’t scrimping on the equipment and I certainly wasn’t going to scrimp on the sound sources anymore so when I found Tidal, I jumped headfirst and amped up to be able to get MQA files, both streaming and downloading. Ran into a little snag though and that was the iPhone wouldn’t send MQA files wirelessly so kept digging and ended up purchasing a Cobalt Dragonfly DAC and connected it to the iPhone via their lightning camera kit to allow the Dragonfly to connect via USB. I then connected it to my amp with a mini jack coming out of the Dragonfly and split to a pair of RCA outlets into an analog connection. Cooking now! Fantastic sound!! My only complaint is that a friend sent me a playlist with about 2000 songs on it and it’s too unwieldy to scroll through. I’ve downloaded all the songs via the playlist but can’t find them outside of the playlist. No new Albums or Artists show up, just the one playlist. Tidal, please fix this!

by Rocavija

I've been a dedicated Apple Music user for years but I'm looking for a change so I created a trial account and so far I've been loving it! Most music streaming services are similar so there really isn't anything revolutionary about another streaming service, it's all about preference. Tidal is a great service that provides a great app, but I have three problems with TIDALMusic and web browser that are making the service difficult to fully enjoy. I don't like that it's not possible to save specific tracks of an album as ONE album, instead they save as "tracks" as a seperate category. I'm a neat freak so I like oragnization and that method of seperateing between tracks and albums is inconvenient. There should be a page for albums (you can save any tracks you want from the album) and there should be a tracks page where ALL the songs in your library are shown and there should be the option to play ALL the tracks on shuffle, or in order, etc. I also don't like that there isn't an option to organize albums by artist AND release date. The first and problem is far more important to me than the second one. I hope Tidal would make this change, if they do, they'll have a subscriber for life.

by Dudemanguy711

I like Tidal’s interface. I like Tidal’s features. I love Tidal’s sound quality. The problem is that TIDALMusic seems to be designed by music lovers that didn’t hire enough tech people. There has never been a time when Tidal was functioning at full potential. There are always glitches holding it back. Recently I’ve had issues with my album library not loading properly (I’m not the only one) so I sent a support request. They responded by asking me for information I had already included in the initial request. Then they said they were already aware of the issue and were working on a solution. I waited five weeks for the next update… still hasn’t been fixed. I have Apple Music and it’s great for a lot of reasons but their introduction of lossless audio has left a lot to be desired. So I still want to use Tidal but it doesn’t seem to want me to use it. I thought maybe when Dorsey bought it he would smooth out the kinks but he seems more interested in NFTs and merchandising than actually running a music streaming company.

by SASSLSWBS

I absolutely love this streaming service! I have a very eclectic mind and listen to everything from Disney to Country to Pop to Rap, and most genres in between.
One thing that I would love to see on here though is the option to search in your own playlist. I have almost 2,000 songs on my “Everyday” playlist, and it can be daunting to scroll and try to remember what number the song was. To make this easier as well, if there was a way to put artists/songs in alphabetical order from a cell phone on your individual playlist, that would be helpful. Even if a search option isn’t in the near future. I know that it is possible from a PC but I haven’t been able to on my phone.
One feature that was added that I am extremely grateful for, was the “duplicate” feature. Some songs I hear on the radio, think to add them on my playlist, and before I wouldn’t know that it was already on there, but now I do! It was just in the mix of the 2,000 that I already have.
All in all, I love the service/app and will (and do) recommend it to anyone that asks what I use.

by JustMyOpinion🤷🏼‍♂️

Great sound quality!!! Only one thing keeping it from getting 5 stars from me. Lyrics. Where are the lyrics??? Why does just about everyone else have this feature and the touting itself as the top dog doesn’t is beyond me. Sound quality over lyrics is definitely my choice for sure, but come one. Something so basic, so average for all the other platforms and you guys don’t have this yet is absolutely crazy. Sure, I could get another app to do that, but why should I? You add that and 5 starts it is. Right now I’m choosing a simple work around. iOS 14.2 beta 1 has Shazam built into the control panel. No need to download Shazam separately. Start the song and click that, and up pops the lyrics. Easy, but when the next song starts to play, you have to do it again. Easy, like I say, but shouldn’t be needed. Currently using iOS 14.2 beta 2 which hasn’t had any improvements on that yet, just a bunch of new emojis. Guess we’ll wait and see if they hurry up and do something that will add their own lyrics in their own app, rather than depend on another company to do it for them. You want the 5 stars, get it done then. Other than that, best of the best!!! 👍

by Xjoker90

So TIDALMusic delivers on audio quality I don’t think anyone can argue that. I used to be use tidal when they had the rotating record (which was really cool) and then left when Apple Music came out and was more affordable and worked well within the apple eco system. I recently came back to tidal about a month ago as I did miss the quality of music, but after being so used to an optimized Apple Music app, coming to this has had its frustrations. First thing I did was transfer my music and then downloaded it to my phone so I can have MQA and HiFi when not on WiFi, which took a while but that was expected. I noticed some annoyances right away. Playing a song, stopping in the middle of it and then coming back to it almost never works. The song just doesn’t start playing and I have to restart the song or skip to the next one. Going to my downloaded collection takes too long for my taste to load, I find myself just waiting for tidal to load my music when I’m trying to play it. These little annoyances haven’t kept me away yet but if they can’t fix it I may switch back to Apple Music, which is a shame since I do really like the quality tidal offers. The Apple TV app and using it on CarPlay also has is nuisances

by Iphone 007

I’m a mastering engineer so as you can my expectations were high for sound quality. I knew the HiFi $20/month would sound better than any other streaming service but I didn’t want to pay that much right now. So I decided to test the premium version (320kbps) against Spotify’s Extreme version (320kbps) and to my surprise Tidal was cleaner, more depth, and overall changed my experience. I am now sold to Tidal until the competition decides to raise their music quality to at least match Tidal’s premium. Tidal still has some work to do to match Spotify’s features like blocking explicit tracks and better integration with other systems like Alexa. And one of the most annoying things about Tidal for me was the constant push of hip hop in your face. I got over it once I started to play more what I liked. The home screen improved a lot after that. But if you’re serious about sound quality and still hesitating spending $20 a month don’t because their $10 version beats any other $10 service.

by FanSinceBWasInDC

The main reason I pay for a TIDAL subscription is because I was under the impression after Tidal’s launch a big part of its culmination was that artists get paid the most directly for their content through TIDAL’s streaming service for their content and most of the money generated doesn’t go disproportionately to the most popular artists like other streaming apps. Confirming and promoting Tidal around this fact would be wise because people want their favorite artists to be paid fairly for their content. It would be even better to broaden this fair share concept for new and upcoming artists.

I also desperately wish some user experience additions were put in place like Shazam, Genius, and Siri integration. The audio quality is top notch and brief but detailed guide on what quality best suits your equipment would be super helpful. Master quality doesn’t seem to be the best choice for every stereo system or headphone set. Overall AWESOME app!

by Jordaaaannnnn

Streaming music on cellular data hasn’t worked for over a month. All my friends and family with TIDAL have this same problem. I like TIDAL and have been trying to justify still paying for it, but at this point I’ve gotta switch to a different service. I reached out to customer support via email to ask how to fix this problem or how to get a refund, and it took 10 days before they responded and asked for my account info. I sent them back my info and a reiteration of the problem. It’s been 2 weeks with no response. I l want to support TIDAL, but they’re not allowing me to use the service they purport to provide (streaming music.) Since they’re not selling me a product, I suppose I’m just giving the company a monthly donation. It’s obvious that they know about the problem but haven’t figured out how to fix it. They’ve released several updates without addressing the problem that MANY users have brought to their attention. When I brought the problem to their attention via email they stopped responding. Again, I’d prefer to be a customer, not a donor. Unfortunately, as of right now, I’m a donor because TIDAL does not offer any service that can be used or consumed.

by Jft.atl

Been using Tidal for a while with no complaints, mostly would like to see some improvements to app like lyrics, but I’m patient and understand it might take a second to implement..Anyways for whatever reason since I updated a version or two ago, my music will not always play and sometimes it’ll cut off. Or, if I add music to the my Play Queue it will not continue playing always. This is kinda of frustrating as I know it’s not my connection because it used to always play and I have no other data issues besides Tidal randomly cutting off. Also I would love if the search could be improved sometimes you could put the EXACT word-for-word/letter-for-letter song and artist into it, and it still will not show up as some of the top results (Example: “Money” by Cardi B does not show up when searched like “Money Cardi B”, instead it shows up her other song “Money Bag” as well as a few more results from other artists before you can find it, so its a little inconvenient)

by Mclaren_7

The service that tidal provides is top notch. After listening to my favorite music for about 10 mins made me realize how great of a product this is. And being a hifi subscriber I have to say it is well worth the money. But having tried many other streaming services I will have to say that the artist section on tidal needs a little work. On other platforms when you download music you can easily just go to the artist section and see all the artist that you listen to. On tidal currently you have to go to the artist profile, like it then the pop up in the artist section. I would just like to go to artist see all the artist I have either liked their profile or downloaded their music. And then I can see all the music by that artist that is in my library and select which album or tracks I want to hear. But overall I like how far tidal has grown in a short time and can’t wait to see where the platform goes next.

by Moorejason1981

Tidal app is what I spent most of my time on. Far as I know they have everything but Tool. I’m sure it’s not cause Tidal forgot. Tidal when playing MASTER QUALITY sounds better than any streaming app I ever wasted my time on. Not all albums or artist are in MQA. But I love seeing that (M) beside a track or by an album. I’m so glad ISO finally got MQA. I knew they was working on it and the day I could play Tidal on my new iPhone XS Max an email was sent and I been blown away by every update and the awesome interface and of course all the music you can search for. Make sure you know they spelling of the band or you may think Tidal doesn’t have it. But sure enough they do. Do yourself all a favor go on and get Tidal HIFI/MQA!!! It’s the one that cost more. Not premium that one is not the best one. It’s still good but spend a few bucks more and listen to the sound!!!!!!!!! Can’t say enough. Jammin right now!!!!!’ Tidal is hands down the best app on my iPhone to date. Thank you to everybody at Tidal!!!!!

by Tillyrg

This is definitely my favorite music streaming app. I love how seamless it is to access an entire album, an artists discography and the credits. I have a couple points of improvement though. First of all; the search functionality. It seems that you need to be extremely precise a in order for TIDALMusic to find the song you want. For example I searched “Love happy Carters” (searching for LOVEHAPPY THE CARTERS) and the the actual track I wanted was no where to be seen. I feel the algorithm is lacking in predicting what the user is searching for.
Secondly, why is the same album posted so many times in an artists discography? It seems that there are 2 explicit albums and 2 clean versions per album. There are so many duplicates it gets frustrating to scroll through. I know, first world problems. But still if feel like the duplicates are unnecessary for both the user and the tidal servers and it should be possible to remove them with ease.
Great app nonetheless.

by Sey Wha?!

I have been using Tidal desktop and app for over a year now. Let me tell you. This is hands down the best streaming app out there. The sound quality in high def and videos as well is unmatched! They have exclusive content that you won't get or see anywhere else on the web. So, don't even try to look for it if an artist says they're only premiering it on Tidal cause they are very strict about that. They offer exclusive early access to concerts and other special events, which I haven't attended yet. But I will very soon. Also, I'm a music producer so I find music based on their algorithms that I can't get on any other streaming app or service. You can tell TIDALMusic was made by very passionate artists and musicians. I love it!!!! And always tell others about it. I have yet to meet someone who doesn't feel the same way I do who has TIDALMusic as well. So, that should tell you something.❤️

by Only Available In Some Areas

I appreciate the videos and custom or exclusive content you get from tidal. Lots of live shows and interviews that I want to see more of from my favorite artists. Not to mention the music videos? Way high quality video and audio sound. 10/10 if you have high quality headphones and appreciate not just hip hop but all good music. Some more obscure stuff is found here, too. Happy to see tidal improving over time. My only complaint is that I can’t get Siri to play something from tidal but that’s apple’s fault not tidal. Would like to see some Siri integration from tidal if possible or on google and Alexa to compete more on that front. Also the suggested song algorithm is pretty good at introducing me to new songs I do like. But I think the algorithm needs more work to improve because I get the same songs over and over. I also want more ways to save my music.

But honestly, tidal is bomb. 9/10 overall

by Miles Sound Music Productions

As an audio professional I appreciate great sound. I have never been a big fan of the mp3 quality of streaming services. I would still buy CDs and download HI-Res files to get the best audio quality available from an artist. That changed when I discovered TIDAL a few years ago. There is no need for me to buy physical media any longer. I still purchase a CD or Hi-Res file occasionally to support the artists that I really love in some cases though. That being said, with a high end DA converter and sound system playing TIDAl, I’m not missing any of the detail in the music. In a way I feel bad that I’m not paying as much money that goes to the artist, but it has been said TIDAL pays more to the artists than the other services do. So if you really love music, pay a little extra and hear the music the way the artist intended. You will notice a huge difference and you’ll be glad you did.