• Terms and conditions apply. 1 month free not available for users who have already tried Premium. Get the family on the Spotify family plan 6 Premium accounts for family members under one roof.
• You can still venture beyond the Free 15, but within those playlists, you'll still be limited to shuffle-play, same as before. Now playing: Watch this: Free Spotify: Here's what's new.

The biggest difference between Spotify Connect and Bluetooth is that Spotify uses higher-quality Wi-Fi connectivity, which is less susceptible to dropouts, sounds better and has a much wider range.

If you're an early Spotify user, you may be looking for a new, free music-streaming service as Spotify's six months of free listening comes to an end.

Trendsetting music lovers who signed up for Spotify when it first hit the U.S. on July 14, 2011 will soon encounter roadblocks. For instance, come the six-month deadline to switch to Spotify Unlimited ($4.99 per month) or Spotify Premium ($9.99 per month), Spotify users will only be able to play their favorite songs a maximum of five times, and free streaming will cap at 10 hours per month.

It's no doubt the unlimited access to a huge library of music — about 15 million tracks — is one of the features that loyal Spotify users love.

Other features include the ability to make playlists of favorite songs (up to 10,000 tracks per list) and social integration to Facebook. Songs you play automatically display on your Facebook Timeline and desktop sidebar. Plus, access content via share buttons and a convenient search bar. With Spotify Premium, users enjoy an offline mode, which means they can listen to playlists on the plane, train or beach. Finally, radio stations specifically tailor to a user's specific artist or genre preferences.

As fun and convenient as Spotify is, for many, the honeymoon phase is over with the service's free music cutoff. Here are five free music-streaming websites and applications that act as alternatives to Spotify.

1. Grooveshark

Grooveshark is a comparable service that provides free on-demand music streaming with ads. Over 30 million people use Grooveshark globally.

How it compares to Spotify: Comparable features include the option to share songs or playlists with friends on Facebook, Twitter, Reddit and other social networking platforms. Like Spotify, Grooveshark offers a downloadable desktop application. Other capabilities include radio-streaming and uploading your own music. Grooveshark also offers song and artist suggestions related to your listening habits.

Differences: Since anyone can upload music to Grooveshark, audio quality of tracks may vary. With Grooveshark, there is no monthly limit for free accounts, as opposed to the 10-hour cap soon to occur on Spotify. However, ads play on both systems.

Size of Music Library: Over 7 Million Songs

Paid Options: Grooveshark-Plus ($6 per month) provides unlimited, ad-free listening. New application Grooveshark-Anywhere offers to-go music streaming at $9 per month.

Mobile Availability: Free radio streaming or on-demand access to music with paid subscription for Android, Nokia, Palm, Blackberry and 'jailbroken iPhones,' as listed on Grooveshark's website.

2. Pandora

Pandora's desktop and mobile free radio-style music-streaming service provides tailored sets of tunes based on the artist or track you input.

How it compares to Spotify: Pandora allows users to easily listen without having to search for tracks or create a playlist. 'The Music Genome Project' behind Pandora generates music related to your search terms. The radio will tweak itself according to your thumbs-up or thumbs-down ratings. However, there are limits to songs skipped per hour. Pandora's social sharing capabilities are pretty weak compared to Spotify's wide range of Facebook, Twitter and Messenger capabilities.

Differences: Spotify is clearly better if you want a wide selection of on-demand music streaming. Pandora Internet radio plays from a smaller collection of 700,000 songs, compared to Spotify's 15 million-song vault.

Size of Music Library: 700,000 tracks

Paid Options: Pandora One ($36 per year) comes with unlimited music play, higher-quality audio, unlimited song skips and no advertisements.

Mobile Availability: Free radio streaming and premium listening via Pandora One options are available on Android 1.6 and later, BlackBerry, iPhone, iPod touch and Palm Pre devices.

3. Rdio

Rdio is a desktop music streaming application that allows new users in the U.S. to access ad-free, on-demand music streaming for an undisclosed amount of time a month. From the co-creators of Skype, Rdio began to offer Rdio Free with a set amount of ad-free, free on-demand music with its Facebook integration in October 2011.

How it compares to Spotify: Both non-paying users of Rdio and Spotify can play music on-demand, share their playlists and favorite songs on numerous social networking websites, receive music recommendations and listen to artist-tailored radio stations. We like how Rdio and Spotify allow free users to browse and listen to top tracks lists, albums and new releases.

Differences: Rdio Free comes ad-free and on-demand, whereas Spotify plays ads in between song sets. The company will not disclose how much time is free for users who opt out of the premium service. Rdio states, 'We’d rather do it this way than bombard people with ads…When you run out of free music in any given month, you can choose to upgrade to any of Rdio’s existing pricing plans or start free anew the following month.'

Size of Music Library: 12 million songs

Paid Options: Rdio Web ($4.99 per month) offers unlimited web streaming from browser or desktop platforms. Rdio Unlimited ($9.99 a month) offers unlimited web streaming plus unlimited mobile streaming. Unlimited Family ($17.99) offers two unlimited web and phone subscriptions.

Mobile Availability: Available on iPad, iPhone, iPod touch, Android 1.6 or higher, Windows Phone 7 devices and Blackberry phones.

4. MOG FreePlay

MOG FreePlay is the free version of its original subscription-required application.

How it compares to Spotify: Like Spotify, MOG FreePlay offers free music streaming with ads. However, for 60 days, new users can listen to MOG FreePlay without ads. Similar to Spotify, MOG FreePlay logs users in through Facebook and shares music with friends. The service provides recommendations based on bands and artists you have Liked on Facebook. Both players have options to create playlists, favorite songs and much more.

Differences: MOG FreePlay also offers an undisclosed amount of play, like Rdio; however, this platform gives you a chance to earn more free music every month by earning points for inviting friends to join MOG.

Size of Music Library: 13 million songs

Paid Options: Paid options for unlimited music include a MOG Basic plan ($4.99 per month), which comes with unlimited, on-demand music for your computer, sans mobile access. The MOG Primo plan for $9.99 per month comes with computer and mobile access and unlimited streaming to your phone.

Mobile Availability: Only available through Primo plan to iPhone, iPod Touch and Android phones.

5. YouTube

While YouTube is a video player, we recommend using YouTube for free, on-demand music streaming if you love listening to songs on-demand. You can use YouTube Disco to find songs by artist. A search for Beyonce turned up 100 videos, mostly from her official VEVO site.

How it compares to Spotify: Create playlists of your favorite songs for listening at work or play. You can also easily share YouTube videos on various social networking platforms.

Differences: Listening to music on-demand on YouTube may be more work — you will have to search for songs to listen to them. However, access plenty of playlists others have pre-packaged.

Mobile Availability: YouTube's pre-installed application works on Android and iOS devices. Downloads are also available on Windows Phones. Web-based versions are available for most smartphones.

What music streaming applications or services do you use? How do they compare with Spotify? Share your thoughts in the comments.

Image courtesy of Flickr, Andreas Blixt

Mastering is the final stage of audio enhancement and key to the listener experience. Read this blog post for a deep dive on the subject.

Looking for a mastering engineer? Connect with professionals on SoundBetter, the world’s leading music production talent marketplace — now part of the Spotify for Artists family.

You can deliver your audio files to us in either FLAC or WAVE format, but we highly recommend using FLAC as it's much easier for us to work with.

When we receive your audio files, we apply the following processes:

• Check they aren’t corrupt and that their format and container is known.
• Convert to WAV 44.1 kHz (keeping bit depth).
• Transcode the file into the following delivery formats for the quality options available to listeners:
• Calculate the loudness using ReplayGain.

Files are also encrypted before they’re delivered to the platform, but this doesn’t affect the resulting files.

Not always. This is because Spotify applies Loudness Normalization to your tracks as they’re played to listeners.

Mastering tips for Spotify

• Target the loudness level of your master at -14 dB integrated LUFS and keep it below -1 dB TP (True Peak) max. This is best for the lossy formats we use (Ogg/Vorbis and AAC) and will ensure no extra distortion is introduced in the transcoding process.
• If your master is louder than -14 dB integrated LUFS, make sure it stays below -2 dB TP (True Peak) max to avoid extra distortion. This is because louder tracks are more susceptible to extra distortion in the transcoding process.

We currently use ReplayGain, which was the most recognized standard for calculating loudness when Spotify first started.

In the future, we plan to use a new standard for calculating loudness, called ITU 1770 (from the International Telecommunication Union). This defines the integrated LUFS (Loudness Units Full Scale) measure, and it’s what we recommend you use to measure the loudness of your tracks.

ReplayGain doesn’t specify a measurement unit for loudness, so we’re unable to give an exact measure in LUFS used by ITTU 1770. However, we adjust tracks to 3 dB higher than ReplayGain algorithm specifies, which is roughly equivalent to -14 dB LUFS, according to the ITU 1770 standard.

Audio files are delivered to Spotify from distributors all over the world and are often mixed/mastered at different volume levels. We want to ensure the best listening experience for users, so we apply Loudness Normalization to create a balance.

It also levels the playing field between soft and loud masters. Louder tracks have often been cited as sounding better to listeners, so Loudness Normalization removes any unfair advantage.

Note: The web player and Spotify apps integrated into third-party devices (such as speakers and TVs) don’t currently use Loudness Normalization.

How does Spotify adjust loudness?

When we receive your audio file, we transcode it to delivery formats Ogg/Vorbis and AAC. At the same time, we calculate the loudness level and store that information as metadata in the transcoded formats of your track.

Playback levels are not adjusted when transcoding tracks. Tracks are delivered to the app with their original volume levels, and positive/negative gain compensation is only applied to a track while it’s playing. This gives users the option to adjust the Loudness Normalization if they want to.

• Negative gain is applied to louder masters so the loudness level is at ca - 14 dB LUFS. This process only decreases the volume in comparison to the master; no additional distortion occurs.
• Positive gain is applied to softer masters so that the loudness level is at ca - 14 dB LUFS. A limiter is also applied, set to engage at -1 dB (sample values), with a 5 ms attack time and a 100 ms decay time. This will prevent any distortion or clipping from soft but dynamic tracks.

The gain is constant throughout the whole track, and calculated to match our desired output loudness level.

Premium users can choose between the following volume normalization levels in their app settings:

• Loud - equalling ca -11 dB LUFS (+6 dB gain multiplied to ReplayGain)
• Normal (default) - equalling ca -14 dB LUFS (+3 dB gain multiplied to ReplayGain)
• Quiet - equalling ca - 23 dB LUFS (-5 dB gain multiplied to ReplayGain)

This is to compensate for where playback isn’t loud enough (e.g. in a noisy environment) or dynamic enough (e.g. in a quiet environment).

Tip: Check out all the audio settings available to listeners, both free and Premium.

Spotify Promotion Free

Nope!

When a user plays your album, we normalize the loudness level of that album at the same time. The entire album will play back at -14 dB LUFS from start to finish, and the gain compensation applied by Spotify won’t change between tracks. This means the softer tracks will be just as soft as you intend them to be.

Spotify Play Booster Download Free

However, if the user plays your album in shuffle, or a track from it in between tracks from other albums (such as in a playlist), we can’t apply album normalization so track level adjustments are used instead.

The loudness of your music depends on how Loudness Normalization relates to your master.

Here are a few reasons why your music may sound different than others:

Organic Spotify Plays

• A track that is very dynamic but mastered to -14 dB LUFS will have its peak levels preserved when played on Spotify. If you compare that to a loudly mastered track, at - 6 dB LUFS for example, its peaks get lowered to - 8 dB LUFS. The two tracks will play back at the same perceived loudness level, but the loud or “peak” parts of the more dynamic track will be much louder.
• If you’re playing your album in shuffle, or in between tracks from other albums (such as in a playlist), track normalization is used. For more info about this, see My album is deliberately mastered to have some tracks softer than others. Will this get lost on Spotify?
• You have inaudible high-frequency content in your mix. Loudness algorithms (both ReplayGain and ITU 1770) do not have a lowpass cut-off filter, meaning any high-frequency content will add up to the energy measured by the algorithms and your track will be measured as louder by the algorithms than is actually perceived.
• You have a really loud master (true peaks well above -2 dB) which makes the encoding add some distortion, adding to the overall energy of the track. That’s the energy as perceived by the algorithm, which might be inaudible to you but adds to the loudness from the algorithm’s perspective.
• You’re not listening to a linear playback system. The ReplayGain algorithm (just like the ITU 1770 algorithm) can’t guess what audio playback system you’re using, so can’t compensate for non-linearity in your system. Meaning, tracks that have more energy in the frequencies your system lifts up will sound much louder on your system.
• As we’re still using the ReplayGain algorithm, you may encounter differences between that and the ITU 1770 algorithm, meaning what you expect from measuring your track with a loudness meter (we recommend ITU 1770) is not exactly what we measure for your track using ReplayGain.