Tesla reveals a new Roadster, due in 2020

At Tesla’s Semi event, the automaker dropped its new Roadster. It’ll have a 620-mile range via a 200kWh battery pack.”You’ll be able to travel from LA to San Francisco and back without recharging,” CEO Elon Musk said. The new Tesla Roadster will do zero to 60 in 1.9 seconds, and it’ll blast through a quarter mile in 8.9 seconds, before reaching a top speed of over 250 MPH.

Oh, and it’s a four-seater.

Musk called it, “a hardcore smackdown to gasoline cars.” The car is due in 2020 so start saving up all your nickels and dimes now — the cost is $250,000, with a $50,000 reservation to get in line for a base model. The first 1,000 “Founders Edition” Roadsters are also available, provided you’re willing to toss in the full $250k right away.

A limited number of folks that attended tonight’s event and put down a $50,000 deposit on the Roadster will get a ride in the car.

Source: Tesla Roadster

Two airlines are bringing faster WiFi to their international flights

Two airlines have made moves to upgrade their WiFi offerings today. Cathay Pacific Group will provide GoGo’s 2Ku satellite-based broadband technology starting in 2018 and Emirates has partnered with Thales to bring 50Mpbs connectivity to its Boeing 777X fleet in 2020.

A number of airlines have caught on to the fact that upping their WiFi game can attract customers. Last year, American Airlines exchanged some of its aircraft’s GoGo internet service for ViaSat’s satellite technology and earlier this year, JetBlue began offering free WiFi to all of its passengers. In September, Delta added WhatsApp to its selection of messaging services, which also includes Facebook Messenger and iMessage, that can be used for free on all WiFi-enabled flights.

Cathay Pacific will install GoGo’s 2Ku service on its Airbus A330 and Boeing 777 aircraft and while Emirates’ upgraded service will take a bit longer to get up and running, it’s certainly better than the AR gimmick it announced in June.

Via: ZDNet, The Verge

Source: GoGo, Inmarsat, Emirates

Utopia’s Skýli cabin lets the Icelandic sky in while keeping the cold out

While sleeping under the stars can be a breathtaking experience, it’s less fun when temperatures begin to approach freezing. If you’ve ever considered hiking in Iceland, a country known for its majestic mountains and glaciers, just the thought of spending the night outside might convince you to skip the Nordic nation altogether, where temperatures can plummet to -22 degrees Fahrenheit.

Enter the Skýli: A shelter created specifically for hikers traveling along the frigid trails of Iceland. Utopia Arkitekter designed the trekking cabin so it could be easily transported and assembled along some of island’s more remote locations. Once erected, the impromptu shelter provides warmth, supplies, and lodging in the region’s harsh weather conditions.

With vibrant, metallic steeples — each of which are painted electric blue to increase visibility — the Skýli is changing the way hikers interact with their surroundings while paying homage to the architecture of Reykjavik, the country’s capital. The modern structure can accommodate up to 15 people and provides two distinct areas for sleeping, one for cooking, and another for storing emergency supplies. Triangular windows sit beneath each crest and offer sprawling views of the region’s rugged scenery.

Best of all, the materials for the Skýli are pre-fabricated and can be delivered via helicopter to your location. The fact that the entire structure can be assembled in two or three days is an added plus, as is the low-impact footprint.

Editors’ Recommendations

• Keep warm when the temperatures drop with the best 4-season tents
• This unique open-air hotel room looks like a giant bird’s nest
• Martians may call these massive domed greenhouses “home”
• 12 awesome treehouses that will make you question life on solid ground
• Enlightened Equipment’s Enigma Quilt let us sleep warm and pack light

SpaceX’s mysterious Zuma mission won’t launch tonight

We still don’t know what Northrop Grumman commissioned SpaceX to launch for the US government, but whatever it is won’t get there tonight. In a move that leaves Elon Musk’s calendar open for the Tesla electric semi-truck reveal (still scheduled for 11 PM ET), SpaceX said it’s standing down on the Zuma mission “to take a closer look at data from recent fairing testing for another customer.” The launch, which is scheduled to include a landing attempt by the Falcon 9’s first stage, could go off tomorrow night, but no new launch date has been confirmed.

Standing down on Zuma mission to take a closer look at data from recent fairing testing for another customer.

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) November 16, 2017

Though we’ve preserved the range opportunity for tomorrow, we’ll take the time needed to complete the data review and then confirm a new launch date.

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) November 16, 2017

Source: SpaceX (Twitter), Space.com

Google cracks down on linkbaiting through AMP

Google officially launched its Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) in February 2016 to be lightweight versions of source websites that used a lot less bandwidth. But some webmasters have deliberately included less content in their AMP editions with a link to the original page, and Google isn’t happy. By next February, AMP pages and their source counterparts must have identical material, the search giant declared.

Sometimes, the lightweight AMP version cuts out ads and links around to other parts of the source page’s website — hence the motivation to provide ‘teaser’ content that users must click through to see the full page. But Google sees this bait-and-switching as infringing on AMP’s mission to ‘dramatically improve the performance of the web and deliver a fast, consistent content consumption experience,’ as the search giant’s blog post put it.

Google assured that, after the February 2018 deadline, should the lightweight AMP version be incomplete compared to the source material, a link will redirect visitors to the original page. This won’t affect those pages’ Search ranking, and Google will invite those webmasters to fix the shortened edition.

Source: Google Blog

EA pulls in-game purchases from ‘Star Wars: Battlefront II’

The launch of Star Wars: Battlefront II has been marred by controversy over the game’s loot system. While players can earn bonuses like new heroes, equipment and vehicles by playing to earn credits that purchase loot crates, they could also buy more crates with “crystals” sold for real-world money. Predictably, the effect of this came off as allowing or encouraging players to pay to win, which has made gamers and even some regulators unhappy. Tonight, EA announced it’s pulling the plug on all in-game purchases, as DICE GM Oskar Gabrielson said the company will “spend more time listening, adjusting, balancing and tuning.”

At first the company tried making some heroes easier to earn, but clearly, that wasn’t enough. Gabrielson says that the plan is for crystal purchases to return eventually, but it’s difficult to see how that will be received well if players are still buying items that have a real impact. While the “digital deluxe edition” has already been playable for a few days, the game’s worldwide launch is happening now — let us know if this changes your decision to buy.

Today, we turned off in-game purchases for #StarWarsBattlefrontII. The game is built on your input, and it will continue to evolve and grow. Read the full update: https://t.co/asGASaYXVp pic.twitter.com/vQSOmsWRgk

— EAStarWars (@EAStarWars) November 17, 2017

Source: EA

Apple Working With Intel on 5G Hardware for Future iPhones

Apple is “leaning heavily” towards choosing Intel’s 5G modems for its future iPhones, according to Fast Company. Apple engineers are said to be already working with Intel on upcoming 5G technology.

Apple’s discussions with Qualcomm about 5G modems, meanwhile, have been described as “limited.”

Citing a source with knowledge of Apple’s plans, Fast Company says that while Qualcomm 5G modems will offer more specialized carrier features, many of those features will not be adopted by carriers, leading Apple to believe Intel’s hardware will be sufficient for future devices.

The end game, multiple sources have said, is to build the Intel modem onto an integrated system-on-a-chip (SoC) that would also contain the CPU, GPU, and other iPhone components. The SoC would be co-designed by Intel and Apple and would be fabricated at an Intel facility.

Intel reportedly has “multiple thousands” of people working on 5G technology in an effort to catch up with Qualcomm and win the contract from Apple.

Intel this morning said that it had made “substantial advances” in its wireless product roadmap to accelerate the adoption of 5G. According to Intel, an end-to-end 5G call based on early 5G silicon has been completed successfully, which Intel says is a “key milestone in its development.”

Intel expects its first 5G chips to roll out in 2019, ahead of the wide rollout of 5G networks. T-Mobile just today said that it is planning to roll out its fifth-generation network across the United States by 2020, and most of the carriers in the United States are already experimenting with limited trials.

5G is expected to deliver speeds that are 10 to 100 times faster than the average 4G connection, at a gigabit per second or higher, along with lower latency and other benefits.

Rumors that Apple is considering Intel’s 5G technology are in line with previous reports that have suggested Apple is considering eliminating Qualcomm chips from its 2018 iPhones and iPads.

Apple and Qualcomm have been embroiled in a bitter legal battle since the beginning of the year, which has continued to escalate over the months. Apple believes Qualcomm charges unfair royalties for “technologies they have nothing to do with,” while Qualcomm claims its technology is “at the heart of every iPhone.”

Apple and Apple suppliers have ceased paying royalties to Qualcomm amid the dispute, while Qualcomm has filed several patent infringement lawsuits against Apple and has asked for import/export bans in the United States and China.

Related Roundup: iPhone XTags: Intel, Qualcomm, 5GBuyer’s Guide: iPhone X (Buy Now)
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Filter promises to let you drink from almost any water source — even urine

Outdoors lovers have a new tool for creating drinkable water with the Fixt Nomad, an intriguing water filter device that promises to let you safely drink out of any non-salt water source.

Public toilets? Check. Stagnant ponds? You bet. Your own urine? Whatever floats your boat! In all cases, you don’t need to worry, since the pocket-sized Fixt Nomad claims it will filter out bacteria, viruses, and any other contaminants.

The pocket-sized filter can be used to purify a single glass of water, attached to a Camelbak or water bladder to purify en masse, or — if that’s not enough — screwed onto your hot water tank to provide hundreds of gallons of clean water in the event of a water outage.

“It uses ionic adsorption, combined with an iodinated resin to kill 99.9999 percent of bacteria and viruses,” creator Ian Stanley told Digital Trends. “Plus, it pulls all the other contaminants through a tortuous path that ensures nothing bad gets through, all while increasing the pH up to a 9.5 to ensure your water is alkaline.”

As an outdoors type, Stanley said he came up with the concept as a way of offering people a “self-reliance” tool that could potentially save their life. “I know water is the difference between life and death in a bad situation,” he said. “We had already made a straw but I wanted something more. That’s how the Nomad was born. I wrestled with quite a few different names, but ultimately called it the Nomad because no smart traveler or outdoorsman or woman should ever leave home without it.”

We haven’t yet got our hands on a Fixt Nomad, but it certainly sounds interesting. If you want to find out more about the project, and potentially even pre-order one of your own, you can do so on Indiegogo. Prices start at $56, with a shipping date set for December of this year — just in time for Christmas. Will it work as well as Stanley claims? We’ll answer that question once we’ve gotten to try it for ourselves, but we certainly hope so. Otherwise, he’s ingested a whole lot of unpurified toilet water.

Editors’ Recommendations

• Take control of your tap water with the DrinkPure screw-on filter
• The Mitte water system doesn’t just purify — it adds minerals to your water, too
• Take a long soak without feeling guilty with the water-saving Rua showerhead
• GardenSpace will water your garden and keep away pests with its robotic head
• Let the river lull you to sleep with the innovative Shoal Tent

Spotify vs. Pandora: Which is better for you?

Pandora and Spotify are both incredibly popular streaming services, built to help users find their favorite jams and to discover tons of new music without having to put in the work. Pandora’s Music Genome Project helped revolutionize the music industry — for better or worse — when it debuted way back in 2000, creating a new standard for online streaming music. Since then, numerous competitors have sprung up, with iHeartRadio, Last.fm, TuneIn, and more aping Pandora’s “radio station” model with varied degrees of success.

Spotify, meanwhile, was conceived by two Swedish businessmen who simply wanted a way to listen to all their favorite music in the same place. The London-based service debuted in 2008 and has since gone gangbusters, growing into one of the most successful on-demand music platforms in the world, with more than 140 million active daily users and more than 50 million paying monthly subscribers. And while Apple Music is the only on-demand service that comes close to matching Spotify’s might, Pandora’s relatively new on-demand service offers even more reasons to give it a shot.

If you’re a music lover, both services are certainly worth using, but if you’re considering upgrading to paid tiers like Spotify Unlimited or Pandora Premium, you’ll want to know what you’re getting for your hard-earned cash. We pit Spotify and Pandora against each other to help you decide which is right for you.

Music catalog

For years, Spotify enjoyed a massive lead in this category, touting tens of millions of songs in an ever-growing library. For most of its tenure, Pandora’s catalog included roughly 1-2 million songs — nothing to scoff at, but hardly a number capable of competing with Spotify or Apple Music. Following the acquisition of Rdio, Pandora inked deals with several major record labels and eventually launched Pandora Premium, its “Spotify Killer” (yeah, right) on-demand service. Spotify still has more music — owed mostly to remixes and covers you won’t find on Pandora — but the libraries are very comparable, and there aren’t any notable artists who appear on one service and not the other. Some artists have exclusive deals in place with other platforms, while others prefer to keep their work away from streaming services entirely. All told, Spotify holds a slim lead in sheer numbers, but there’s essentially no difference between the two here.

Winner: Tie

Social features

There’s no denying music’s incredible power to connect people. Realizing this is a valuable tool, Pandora and Spotify afford their users the ability to connect with friends, share their favorite songs, or simply recommend artists and playlists. However, these streaming clients differ vastly when it comes to comparing the social components akin to each service. Pandora’s rather lackluster attempt at social features essentially offers little to satisfy social media junkies. Users do have the ability to share their favorite stations across Facebook and Twitter, but because on-demand playback is locked behind a paywall, it feels fairly empty.

Spotify easily gets the nod in this category, providing users with a slew of options for sharing music and connecting with friends. Spotify users all have the ability to share individual songs, entire playlists, and even specific artists with any of their friends/followers on Facebook, Twitter, Telegram, Skype, or Tumblr by simply clicking the three dots on the right. Spotify also added bar codes to songs, which you can scan with your phone for song data. The service also allows users to collaborate on playlists, and even make them public for anybody to follow. Simply put, Spotify wins this one easily.

Winner: Spotify

Music discovery

Everybody wants to find musical diamonds in the rough, and a big part of a streaming platform’s value comes from its ability to help users find new tunes. Music discovery is the backbone of Pandora. The Music Genome Project we mentioned above is the engine that drives Pandora, offering the uncanny ability to provide listeners with songs they’ll like based on a vast amount of variables. In addition to creating radio stations, the Music Genome Project helps to curate playlists (if you’ve got Pandora Premium) by automatically adding music once you’ve selected a few songs.

Spotify is no slouch in this category, either, and the company has made acquisitions to get better at it over time. The extremely popular “Discover Weekly” playlist, a 30-song list that magically shows up each Monday, blends music you love with music you’re likely to love. Spotify is constantly adding similar features so you can keep discovering. Spotify’s home interface is also brimming with themed playlists, and you’re just one click away from the “Discover” tab, which features personalized recommendations based on your listening history. We’re still inclined to give Pandora the nod here, however. After all, music discovery is its primary function and its radio stations far outshine Spotify’s at present, but Spotify’s Discover Weekly feature is hard to beat.

Winner: Pandora

Free vs paid versions

Both services offer free — albeit limited — access to streaming music supported by occasional ad breaks. The ads aren’t overwhelming, and the free offerings provide a great way to test drive these services before splurging on a premium account, but these services differ greatly.

With a free Pandora account, subscribers are limited to radio functionality — pick a song (or an artist, or an album, or any combination), and it builds you a station. Hit the “thumbs up” button to tell Pandora to play similar music in the future, and hit the “thumbs down” button to make sure you never hear that song (or songs like it) again. Moreover, users of free options only have access to a lower-quality audio stream (limited to 64k AAC+ at best), and aren’t afforded the luxury of downloading a desktop client like users of Pandora Plus or Pandora Premium. Both mobile and web users have access to similar features — the same amount of skipped songs, the same available stations, and the same occasional advertisement.

For Spotify users, the free experience is far more robust. The ads are here, too — as is the loss in audio quality — but with a free Spotify account, you can listen to music on-demand via the desktop and web apps (mobile users are limited to “shuffle play”). You can create radio stations based on selected music, too.

You can also try the ad-free versions of each service for free. Pandora offers a 60-day free trial of its $10/month Pandora Premium service (which includes ad-free radio and on-demand streaming), 30 free days of its $5/month Pandora Plus service (ad-free radio stations, but no on-demand streaming), while Spotify offers a free 30-day trial of its $10/month Spotify Premium service (on-demand listening and radio stations). Both services also offer a discount for yearly membership.

With free access to on-demand music, Spotify takes this category every time.

Winner: Spotify

Cost

While Spotify may offer better choices for free-loaders, Pandora’s $5/month tier is a killer option for those who want to rock out to quality tunes, but don’t have the scratch to shell out the full $10 per month (though we find it hard to believe that’s a burden for most folks). If you want to go ad-free with Spotify, you’ll have to go all in, which gives Pandora the win.

Winner: Pandora

User interface & experience

Though not necessarily a deal-breaker — both platforms look and feel great — it’s worth pointing out how the user experience differs between services. Pandora offers three different methods for playing music; a mobile application for Android or iOS, an in-browser player, or a downloadable desktop program (Pandora Plus or Premium only). With an easy-to-use interface and intuitive controls, each version provides largely the same experience. Users also have the ability to sort radio stations either alphabetically or by date for quick access. No matter which way you listen, you’ll have access to background information on the artist currently playing, listings of similar artists, and links for users to quickly buy any song that strikes their fancy. “Browse” and “My stations” sections allow you to quickly switch between listening and discovering.

Spotify also offers three apps — web, desktop, and mobile for Android or iOS — and they all feature an incredibly polished user interface. The desktop version functions like iTunes (but less cluttered), meaning most people should find navigating it straightforward and intuitive. Searching for music via the program’s search bar produces Google-like results, auto-generating artists, songs, or albums as you type. On both the mobile and desktop versions, the left item bar offers easy-to-access links to saved playlists, local files, downloaded songs, and Spotify Radio stations. When using the Browse feature, users have access to newly released music, daily curated music news, and a discovery tab that recommends new artists and songs based on a user’s listening history. There’s no denying that Spotify offers users a more well-rounded user experience, and its solid platform and slick interface make it an even more attractive option. Pandora’s no slouch, but Spotify reigns supreme here.

Winner: Spotify

Other information

Location: If you’re not located in the United States, go ahead and ignore Pandora altogether — it’s only available stateside following the removal of support in Oceania territories. Spotify, on the other hand, is available in a vast number of countries.

Compatibility: With Wi-Fi-enabled smart speakers reaching an all-time peak in popularity, you might want to consider whether your favorite speaker is natively compatible with Spotify or Pandora. Popular smart speakers like the Sonos One and the Amazon Echo line support both Spotify Connect and Pandora Everywhere via Wi-Fi; here’s a full list of Spotify devices and a full list of Pandora devices.

Conclusion

Despite having existed for nearly twice as long, Pandora simply can’t keep up with Spotify’s impressive versatility and usability. The recent introduction of Pandora Premium means users can finally listen to a massive collection of specific songs and albums at their pleasure, but Pandora is playing catchup at this point, and it’s pretty far behind. Spotify has better social features, better apps, and more value for your dollar. If you’re constantly looking to expand your musical horizons, Pandora is absolutely a reasonable investment, but in general, we recommend choosing Spotify.

Overall winner: Spotify

Updated: Added new information, including Pandora’s on-demand tier, pricing, and free-trial availability.

Editors’ Recommendations

• Jam out to a ‘Hipster Brunch’ playlist with Pandora’s Featured Playlists
• You can now control Sonos smart speakers directly from the Pandora app
• Music junkie? Here are the 25 best music apps for consuming and creating tunes
• Breaking the law not your thing? Here are the best free music download sites
• SoundHound redesigns its music discovery app, adds new discovery features

Spotify vs. Pandora: Which is better for you?

Pandora and Spotify are both incredibly popular streaming services, built to help users find their favorite jams and to discover tons of new music without having to put in the work. Pandora’s Music Genome Project helped revolutionize the music industry — for better or worse — when it debuted way back in 2000, creating a new standard for online streaming music. Since then, numerous competitors have sprung up, with iHeartRadio, Last.fm, TuneIn, and more aping Pandora’s “radio station” model with varied degrees of success.

Spotify, meanwhile, was conceived by two Swedish businessmen who simply wanted a way to listen to all their favorite music in the same place. The London-based service debuted in 2008 and has since gone gangbusters, growing into one of the most successful on-demand music platforms in the world, with more than 140 million active daily users and more than 50 million paying monthly subscribers. And while Apple Music is the only on-demand service that comes close to matching Spotify’s might, Pandora’s relatively new on-demand service offers even more reasons to give it a shot.

If you’re a music lover, both services are certainly worth using, but if you’re considering upgrading to paid tiers like Spotify Unlimited or Pandora Premium, you’ll want to know what you’re getting for your hard-earned cash. We pit Spotify and Pandora against each other to help you decide which is right for you.

Music catalog

For years, Spotify enjoyed a massive lead in this category, touting tens of millions of songs in an ever-growing library. For most of its tenure, Pandora’s catalog included roughly 1-2 million songs — nothing to scoff at, but hardly a number capable of competing with Spotify or Apple Music. Following the acquisition of Rdio, Pandora inked deals with several major record labels and eventually launched Pandora Premium, its “Spotify Killer” (yeah, right) on-demand service. Spotify still has more music — owed mostly to remixes and covers you won’t find on Pandora — but the libraries are very comparable, and there aren’t any notable artists who appear on one service and not the other. Some artists have exclusive deals in place with other platforms, while others prefer to keep their work away from streaming services entirely. All told, Spotify holds a slim lead in sheer numbers, but there’s essentially no difference between the two here.

Winner: Tie

Social features

There’s no denying music’s incredible power to connect people. Realizing this is a valuable tool, Pandora and Spotify afford their users the ability to connect with friends, share their favorite songs, or simply recommend artists and playlists. However, these streaming clients differ vastly when it comes to comparing the social components akin to each service. Pandora’s rather lackluster attempt at social features essentially offers little to satisfy social media junkies. Users do have the ability to share their favorite stations across Facebook and Twitter, but because on-demand playback is locked behind a paywall, it feels fairly empty.

Spotify easily gets the nod in this category, providing users with a slew of options for sharing music and connecting with friends. Spotify users all have the ability to share individual songs, entire playlists, and even specific artists with any of their friends/followers on Facebook, Twitter, Telegram, Skype, or Tumblr by simply clicking the three dots on the right. Spotify also added bar codes to songs, which you can scan with your phone for song data. The service also allows users to collaborate on playlists, and even make them public for anybody to follow. Simply put, Spotify wins this one easily.

Winner: Spotify

Music discovery

Everybody wants to find musical diamonds in the rough, and a big part of a streaming platform’s value comes from its ability to help users find new tunes. Music discovery is the backbone of Pandora. The Music Genome Project we mentioned above is the engine that drives Pandora, offering the uncanny ability to provide listeners with songs they’ll like based on a vast amount of variables. In addition to creating radio stations, the Music Genome Project helps to curate playlists (if you’ve got Pandora Premium) by automatically adding music once you’ve selected a few songs.

Spotify is no slouch in this category, either, and the company has made acquisitions to get better at it over time. The extremely popular “Discover Weekly” playlist, a 30-song list that magically shows up each Monday, blends music you love with music you’re likely to love. Spotify is constantly adding similar features so you can keep discovering. Spotify’s home interface is also brimming with themed playlists, and you’re just one click away from the “Discover” tab, which features personalized recommendations based on your listening history. We’re still inclined to give Pandora the nod here, however. After all, music discovery is its primary function and its radio stations far outshine Spotify’s at present, but Spotify’s Discover Weekly feature is hard to beat.

Winner: Pandora

Free vs paid versions

Both services offer free — albeit limited — access to streaming music supported by occasional ad breaks. The ads aren’t overwhelming, and the free offerings provide a great way to test drive these services before splurging on a premium account, but these services differ greatly.

With a free Pandora account, subscribers are limited to radio functionality — pick a song (or an artist, or an album, or any combination), and it builds you a station. Hit the “thumbs up” button to tell Pandora to play similar music in the future, and hit the “thumbs down” button to make sure you never hear that song (or songs like it) again. Moreover, users of free options only have access to a lower-quality audio stream (limited to 64k AAC+ at best), and aren’t afforded the luxury of downloading a desktop client like users of Pandora Plus or Pandora Premium. Both mobile and web users have access to similar features — the same amount of skipped songs, the same available stations, and the same occasional advertisement.

For Spotify users, the free experience is far more robust. The ads are here, too — as is the loss in audio quality — but with a free Spotify account, you can listen to music on-demand via the desktop and web apps (mobile users are limited to “shuffle play”). You can create radio stations based on selected music, too.

You can also try the ad-free versions of each service for free. Pandora offers a 60-day free trial of its $10/month Pandora Premium service (which includes ad-free radio and on-demand streaming), 30 free days of its $5/month Pandora Plus service (ad-free radio stations, but no on-demand streaming), while Spotify offers a free 30-day trial of its $10/month Spotify Premium service (on-demand listening and radio stations). Both services also offer a discount for yearly membership.

With free access to on-demand music, Spotify takes this category every time.

Winner: Spotify

Cost

While Spotify may offer better choices for free-loaders, Pandora’s $5/month tier is a killer option for those who want to rock out to quality tunes, but don’t have the scratch to shell out the full $10 per month (though we find it hard to believe that’s a burden for most folks). If you want to go ad-free with Spotify, you’ll have to go all in, which gives Pandora the win.

Winner: Pandora

User interface & experience

Though not necessarily a deal-breaker — both platforms look and feel great — it’s worth pointing out how the user experience differs between services. Pandora offers three different methods for playing music; a mobile application for Android or iOS, an in-browser player, or a downloadable desktop program (Pandora Plus or Premium only). With an easy-to-use interface and intuitive controls, each version provides largely the same experience. Users also have the ability to sort radio stations either alphabetically or by date for quick access. No matter which way you listen, you’ll have access to background information on the artist currently playing, listings of similar artists, and links for users to quickly buy any song that strikes their fancy. “Browse” and “My stations” sections allow you to quickly switch between listening and discovering.

Spotify also offers three apps — web, desktop, and mobile for Android or iOS — and they all feature an incredibly polished user interface. The desktop version functions like iTunes (but less cluttered), meaning most people should find navigating it straightforward and intuitive. Searching for music via the program’s search bar produces Google-like results, auto-generating artists, songs, or albums as you type. On both the mobile and desktop versions, the left item bar offers easy-to-access links to saved playlists, local files, downloaded songs, and Spotify Radio stations. When using the Browse feature, users have access to newly released music, daily curated music news, and a discovery tab that recommends new artists and songs based on a user’s listening history. There’s no denying that Spotify offers users a more well-rounded user experience, and its solid platform and slick interface make it an even more attractive option. Pandora’s no slouch, but Spotify reigns supreme here.

Winner: Spotify

Other information

Location: If you’re not located in the United States, go ahead and ignore Pandora altogether — it’s only available stateside following the removal of support in Oceania territories. Spotify, on the other hand, is available in a vast number of countries.

Compatibility: With Wi-Fi-enabled smart speakers reaching an all-time peak in popularity, you might want to consider whether your favorite speaker is natively compatible with Spotify or Pandora. Popular smart speakers like the Sonos One and the Amazon Echo line support both Spotify Connect and Pandora Everywhere via Wi-Fi; here’s a full list of Spotify devices and a full list of Pandora devices.

Conclusion

Despite having existed for nearly twice as long, Pandora simply can’t keep up with Spotify’s impressive versatility and usability. The recent introduction of Pandora Premium means users can finally listen to a massive collection of specific songs and albums at their pleasure, but Pandora is playing catchup at this point, and it’s pretty far behind. Spotify has better social features, better apps, and more value for your dollar. If you’re constantly looking to expand your musical horizons, Pandora is absolutely a reasonable investment, but in general, we recommend choosing Spotify.

Overall winner: Spotify

Updated: Added new information, including Pandora’s on-demand tier, pricing, and free-trial availability.

Editors’ Recommendations

• Jam out to a ‘Hipster Brunch’ playlist with Pandora’s Featured Playlists
• You can now control Sonos smart speakers directly from the Pandora app
• Music junkie? Here are the 25 best music apps for consuming and creating tunes
• Breaking the law not your thing? Here are the best free music download sites
• SoundHound redesigns its music discovery app, adds new discovery features