Here is the well-structured article based on the original content:

**A Critical Look at YouTube Music**

As an ecosystem standpoint, I was disappointed to find that YouTube Music does not offer a first-party desktop client. While it's great that they provide a full-fledged interface on the web, having a dedicated lightweight app would be more ideal to free up browser resources.

When it comes to music apps, frictionless and straightforward interfaces are key. For many users, including myself, music is an essential part of their daily life, providing comfort and solace. With this in mind, UX can be a delicate subject.

I've previously mentioned that Spotify's mobile app can be overwhelming, but I think it's miles better than what YouTube Music offers. Even just comparing the home tabs shows how much more organized Spotify is. The information is still there, but it's not overwhelming. Frequently listened to collections are right up top, and curated playlists like mixes and artist playlists are towards the bottom.

YouTube Music, on the other hand, feels clunky and unorganized. No matter the size of the smartphone screen, the scaling of this app feels too big. Scrolling through recommendations and suggestions can feel like a chore, especially when trying to find something new to listen to. The issue is also that track metadata, such as title, artist, and album art, is often inconsistent and formatted differently between sources.

This inconsistency can lead to muddy recommendations, making it difficult for users to discover new music. When YouTube Music pulls videos of remixes or covers off random users, it's frustrating because you expect consistency and order. The copyright matching tool does an okay job at marking descriptions of unofficial uploads with copyright info, but it's not foolproof.

There's also a free tier for YouTube Music that's ad-supported, similar to Spotify. However, one major con is that it doesn't allow playback in the background on mobile devices, which makes no sense whatsoever.

Overall, I don't think YouTube Music is better than Spotify. While there are aspects that miss the mark, if you simply want to listen to your tunes, the value is certainly there with it being included with YouTube Premium. Just be aware of the moral implications and interface issues.

**What do you guys think?**

WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enYouTube music and Spotify are two of the most popular ways to stream your favorite songs but which one is better let's talk about it now by the Numbers Spotify is the king of music streaming we are talking 210 million paid subscribers and 500 million if we're counting the free ad supported users in a recent video where I put Spotify head to head with apple music I fell in love with its emphasis on Discovery which led me to find tons of new artists in the month that I spent with it surprisingly I actually ended up keeping my Spotify subscription though a lot of you took to the comments wondering what about YouTube music why didn't you talk about YouTube music Ned so thanks to peer pressure some mild racism I had to check out YouTube music for myself to find out if it's true better than platforms like Spotify and apple music my name is Ken there are a handful of things I've come to appreciate in the few weeks I've spent with YouTube music first since I'm already paying for YouTube premium or rather I am part of Austin's family which happens to have YouTube premium thanks Dad what you do you want Daddy I don't I don't know what to tell you the subscription music included at no extra cost and in case it isn't abundantly clear this is a stand-alone music streaming service that operates in tandem with YouTube this is an important distinction to make because YouTube music has its own apps has its own officially licensed music library sourced from most major labels and even has officially curated playlists like you'd find on Spotify and apple however the secret sauce that sets YouTube music apart from the competition is that you're able to search through YouTube's vast library of user generated content for additional media that other platforms might not have think stuff like live performances covers remixes bootlegs or hella Indie music that for one reason or another only live on YouTube with Hit or Miss availability for some tracks in my J-pop fandom for example YouTube music has been able to bridge some gaps that simply isn't possible on other platforms and that's very cool regardless us of whether you are sourcing tracks from the YouTube music library or actual YouTube itself you can stream and even download audio only which is especially helpful on mobile if you're trying to keep data usage low and maximize available storage space on your device in terms of sound quality it's generally pretty good on this platform songs available in YouTube music's Library generally top out at 256 kilobits AAC which sounds more or less as good as Spotify though of course your mileage will vary if you start sourcing music from core YouTube funny enough if you go to change the audio quality in the player you can set it as high as 1080p I can almost zero the pixels now okay 192 kilohertz oh final oh naturally YouTube music has a toggle right at the top of your now playing screen by default it'll be on song when you select a track but if you hit video it will of course pull up an actual music video if there's one available so to sum up all of the positives if track variety and accessibility are your priority when shopping around for streaming services YouTube music is a very competitive option in the space however there are a few negative aspects that can't be ignored first thing from an ecosystem standpoint I don't like that YouTube music doesn't offer a first party desktop client while it's cool that they give you a full-fledged interface on the web having a dedicated lightweight app is more ideal to free up your browser speaking of which let's talk about the YouTube Music Experience on mobile in my opinion music apps generally work the best when they're frictionless and straightforward after all there are plenty of people myself include who seek comfort in music to get through their everyday life so with that in mind ux can be a bit of a delicate subject now I've gone on record before saying that spotify's mobile app is a touch overwhelming however I do think that it's miles better than what they're doing on YouTube music comparing even just the home tabs shows this off very well Spotify has a lot going on here but it's organized amid the chaos it doesn't take long to orient yourself around this screen given how much information it's feeding you your frequently listened to collections are right up top they actually squeeze a whole lot of them up there because they know you'll probably want to hear them again then towards the bottom it curates things like mixes and artist playlists Spotify really wants to get you into the music you want to hear YouTube music on the other hand while it takes similar cues from Spotify it feels way more clunky no matter the size of smartphone screen I'm using the scaling on this app feels way too big it might sound a bit nitpicky but when decision paralysis hits and you're trying to find something to listen to having to scroll through more suggestions and recommendations feel like a chore come on you can fit more than two artists on the screen what certainly doesn't help is that track metadata AKA things like title artist and album art is a God damn nightmare which makes the interface even worse I mean think about it yes music Source directly from labels and artists have consistent formatting that's easy to read at a glance however take tracks from core YouTube like actual videos and all of a sudden it's the wild west the issue here is that metadata formatting can often vary between sources which can muddy your recommendations that the system serves you this isn't a hundred percent YouTube's fault necessarily but it's simply the nature of how the system works the amount of times I've had YouTube music pull a video of a remix or a dance cover or something and pass it off to me as official it's kind of frustrating as someone that likes order and consistency with my music speaking of which since YouTube music can Source tracks uploaded by random users it's a bit sketch when it comes to making sure that your favorite artists are getting the play counts and revenue they deserve YouTube's copyright matching tool does an okay job at marking descriptions of unofficial uploads with copyright info while making sure that the artists get Revenue off the views but it isn't foolproof for example there's a cover artist that I follow called horatia that does soothing covers of popular J-pop songs across a few Channels with millions of subscribers type her name into YouTube music search then scroll down a mere inch and you'll find cover compilations with millions of views each but judging by the fact that YouTube lists each of these videos as singular songs under an artist named one hour Japan music I doubt harutia is seeing a single dime and that's potentially thousands upon upon thousands of AdSense dollars going to someone leeching off her content and there's plenty of examples of this happening across YouTube and lastly there's actually a free tier for YouTube music that's ad supported kind of like Spotify however it does not let you play music in the background on mobile just very dumb and makes no sense whatsoever and therefore is probably the biggest con of them all so is YouTube music better than Spotify in my opinion not even close there are plenty of things that miss the mark for me personally but if you simply want to listen to your tunes the value is certainly there with it being included with YouTube premium just don't look at the moral cost or the interface or just don't at all what I want to know was I too harsh on YouTube music drop me a line in the comments below I'm sure you guys would absolutely love to do that and otherwise thanks for watching this episode on denki Channel let's goYouTube music and Spotify are two of the most popular ways to stream your favorite songs but which one is better let's talk about it now by the Numbers Spotify is the king of music streaming we are talking 210 million paid subscribers and 500 million if we're counting the free ad supported users in a recent video where I put Spotify head to head with apple music I fell in love with its emphasis on Discovery which led me to find tons of new artists in the month that I spent with it surprisingly I actually ended up keeping my Spotify subscription though a lot of you took to the comments wondering what about YouTube music why didn't you talk about YouTube music Ned so thanks to peer pressure some mild racism I had to check out YouTube music for myself to find out if it's true better than platforms like Spotify and apple music my name is Ken there are a handful of things I've come to appreciate in the few weeks I've spent with YouTube music first since I'm already paying for YouTube premium or rather I am part of Austin's family which happens to have YouTube premium thanks Dad what you do you want Daddy I don't I don't know what to tell you the subscription music included at no extra cost and in case it isn't abundantly clear this is a stand-alone music streaming service that operates in tandem with YouTube this is an important distinction to make because YouTube music has its own apps has its own officially licensed music library sourced from most major labels and even has officially curated playlists like you'd find on Spotify and apple however the secret sauce that sets YouTube music apart from the competition is that you're able to search through YouTube's vast library of user generated content for additional media that other platforms might not have think stuff like live performances covers remixes bootlegs or hella Indie music that for one reason or another only live on YouTube with Hit or Miss availability for some tracks in my J-pop fandom for example YouTube music has been able to bridge some gaps that simply isn't possible on other platforms and that's very cool regardless us of whether you are sourcing tracks from the YouTube music library or actual YouTube itself you can stream and even download audio only which is especially helpful on mobile if you're trying to keep data usage low and maximize available storage space on your device in terms of sound quality it's generally pretty good on this platform songs available in YouTube music's Library generally top out at 256 kilobits AAC which sounds more or less as good as Spotify though of course your mileage will vary if you start sourcing music from core YouTube funny enough if you go to change the audio quality in the player you can set it as high as 1080p I can almost zero the pixels now okay 192 kilohertz oh final oh naturally YouTube music has a toggle right at the top of your now playing screen by default it'll be on song when you select a track but if you hit video it will of course pull up an actual music video if there's one available so to sum up all of the positives if track variety and accessibility are your priority when shopping around for streaming services YouTube music is a very competitive option in the space however there are a few negative aspects that can't be ignored first thing from an ecosystem standpoint I don't like that YouTube music doesn't offer a first party desktop client while it's cool that they give you a full-fledged interface on the web having a dedicated lightweight app is more ideal to free up your browser speaking of which let's talk about the YouTube Music Experience on mobile in my opinion music apps generally work the best when they're frictionless and straightforward after all there are plenty of people myself include who seek comfort in music to get through their everyday life so with that in mind ux can be a bit of a delicate subject now I've gone on record before saying that spotify's mobile app is a touch overwhelming however I do think that it's miles better than what they're doing on YouTube music comparing even just the home tabs shows this off very well Spotify has a lot going on here but it's organized amid the chaos it doesn't take long to orient yourself around this screen given how much information it's feeding you your frequently listened to collections are right up top they actually squeeze a whole lot of them up there because they know you'll probably want to hear them again then towards the bottom it curates things like mixes and artist playlists Spotify really wants to get you into the music you want to hear YouTube music on the other hand while it takes similar cues from Spotify it feels way more clunky no matter the size of smartphone screen I'm using the scaling on this app feels way too big it might sound a bit nitpicky but when decision paralysis hits and you're trying to find something to listen to having to scroll through more suggestions and recommendations feel like a chore come on you can fit more than two artists on the screen what certainly doesn't help is that track metadata AKA things like title artist and album art is a God damn nightmare which makes the interface even worse I mean think about it yes music Source directly from labels and artists have consistent formatting that's easy to read at a glance however take tracks from core YouTube like actual videos and all of a sudden it's the wild west the issue here is that metadata formatting can often vary between sources which can muddy your recommendations that the system serves you this isn't a hundred percent YouTube's fault necessarily but it's simply the nature of how the system works the amount of times I've had YouTube music pull a video of a remix or a dance cover or something and pass it off to me as official it's kind of frustrating as someone that likes order and consistency with my music speaking of which since YouTube music can Source tracks uploaded by random users it's a bit sketch when it comes to making sure that your favorite artists are getting the play counts and revenue they deserve YouTube's copyright matching tool does an okay job at marking descriptions of unofficial uploads with copyright info while making sure that the artists get Revenue off the views but it isn't foolproof for example there's a cover artist that I follow called horatia that does soothing covers of popular J-pop songs across a few Channels with millions of subscribers type her name into YouTube music search then scroll down a mere inch and you'll find cover compilations with millions of views each but judging by the fact that YouTube lists each of these videos as singular songs under an artist named one hour Japan music I doubt harutia is seeing a single dime and that's potentially thousands upon upon thousands of AdSense dollars going to someone leeching off her content and there's plenty of examples of this happening across YouTube and lastly there's actually a free tier for YouTube music that's ad supported kind of like Spotify however it does not let you play music in the background on mobile just very dumb and makes no sense whatsoever and therefore is probably the biggest con of them all so is YouTube music better than Spotify in my opinion not even close there are plenty of things that miss the mark for me personally but if you simply want to listen to your tunes the value is certainly there with it being included with YouTube premium just don't look at the moral cost or the interface or just don't at all what I want to know was I too harsh on YouTube music drop me a line in the comments below I'm sure you guys would absolutely love to do that and otherwise thanks for watching this episode on denki Channel let's go