Tidal Hi-Fi now allows you to stream Dolby Atmos Music into your home cinema kit and we couldn’t be happier

All hail Jay-Z! Music streaming service Tidal is finally unlocking Dolby Atmos Music, allowing it to be streamed over HDMI to Atmos-enabled AV hardware and home cinema systems. Until now, Tidal’s Atmos mixes have been restricted to headphone listening, with their true three-dimensional potential hidden.

The immersive sound format is only available to Tidal Hi-Fi tier subscribers, yet will work across a variety of streaming platforms, provided they’re running the latest version of the Tidal app. Apple TV 4K, the Fire TV Stick 4K and Fire TV Cube, Fire TV Stick (second gen), Fire TV (third gen), and Nvidia Shield TV are all compatible.

Tidal Hi-Fi will automatically default to a Dolby Atmos mix when compatible devices are available. To locate songs in Dolby Atmos, go to the Home screen and look under ‘Available in Dolby Atmos’ or search ‘Dolby Atmos’.

Currently, the amount of content available in Dolby Atmos Music is limited and predictably mainstream - you can listen to Ariana Grande’s 7 rings, The Weeknd’s After Hours, or Shawn Mendes and Kelly Clarkson’s IDare you, but nothing from Slayer or Iron Maiden. However, these are early days. Our top tip is R.E.M’s Automatic For The People.

Dolby Atmos Music is also available on Amazon Music HD, but currently there’s no hardware available to get this out of the ether and into your home cinema system. The only option is the Amazon Echo Studio speaker. Hopefully, Tidal’s move will prompt Amazon to do the same thing.

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