Sound quality on LG TV Spotify app seems to be low bit rate only

[asdohw]

Plan

Premium

Country

Germany

Device

LG OLED G6 TV from 2016

Operating System

webOS 3.4.0-6008

App Version

2022.11.21_2-bfddde86 H 4.27.2

My Issue

In comparison to other playback devices, the Spotify app on my LG OLED TV seems to play always with a low bit rate quality. When I test the same songs over an apple TV 4k the sound quality seems to be a higher bit rate. All tested over the same sound system using the S/PDIF output of the TV. There was a recent update of the Spotify TV app.

However, I cannot recall when that issue appeared, I just recently realized that recently. In the meantime I need to listen with the apple TV, the low audio quality of the TV app is not enjoyable.

Can you please check if something went wrong with the bit rate selection in the newest update of the TV app?

Does anybody else have this issue?

It would be also very useful to have the possibility to select the sound quality in the TV app as well.

Thanks!

[MihailY]

Hey @asdohw,

Thanks for posting in the Community.

Can you please check if there's any noticeable difference in the audio quality when playing through the TV's built-in speakers?

Also, it would be very useful if you can record a direct comparison between the two apps, so we can forward the findings to the relevant team.

Keep us posted!

[asdohw]

Hey,

sorry for the late answer.

I tested with the TV speakers, same results. Playing via the TV app, the sound is very low quality with a lot of compression artifacts. Switching to the Apple TV the sound is much clearer.

See the attachment for comparison. Unfortunately the video compression makes it a bit hard to compare because of the 5MB file upload limit. But if you listen closely, you can hear the compression artifacts in the treble at the start.

If needed I can post an audio file of that video, too.

[Alex]

Hi there @asdohw,

Thanks for the post.

Some LG TVs have certain limitations when it comes to streaming music from the Spotify TV app. I'd suggest using Chromecast if your TV supports it, so that you can achieve better audio quality.  

You can also have a look at this thread for more info and workarounds suggested by other community members.

Hope this helps.