Are you a Spotify or a Pandora person?
(above image by naobim from Pixabay)
Let me explain. Are you the kind of person who likes lists? Do you like modifying them, adding to them and deleting items from your lists?
Or are you the kind of person who would rather focus on one topic at a time, yet are open to suggestions to add to that topic and broaden your scope?
I know this is a bit theoretical, but it represents the two different approaches Spotify and Pandora take in their streaming services.
Pandora is very artist-centered. I like that, because usually when I think of what I would like to hear, I am thinking, "I would like to listen to something by this artist, or this band. I usually do not have a particular song in mind. Pandora works like this with their "stations".
You start with one station and then subsequent selections are provided that have similarities to the artist(s) you have chosen. It is also very easy to see the lyrics for any particular song. I haven't figured out how to do that yet on Spotify, because I am new to the service. I have been using Pandora for years.
Spotify asks you to build a playlist of songs and particular artists and then makes suggestions to add to your playlist which you can accept or reject. I like how finely tuned the playlists are, and they also help me to discover additional songs by the artists in my playlist.
Pandora seems to encourage continuous branching out of your musical tastes. Also, I have not found a way to listen to an entire album of an artist the way Spotify can do quite easily.
The advertising on Pandora is incessant, although for a mere $ 4.95 for their basic level upgrade you can eliminate ads.
Since I am not looking to download songs and listen to them on a portable device, this feature does not concern me, but I believe Spotify has the edge in this regard.
So there you are. This is a brief review of these 2 music streaming service. Your choice depends on what type of person you are. I find I am a bit of both, so I use both services.
One final note. I have found that Pandora seems more likely to fail on occasion, although it does not happen very often, If it fails you basically have to change to use another device. There is very poor support for the platform, even on their paid service. Pandora has a 30-day trial on their paid service, while Spotify has a 90-day trial period. Which do you prefer?
David