Tod MaffinCanadian Commentator, From Far and Wide · Emotional Support Canadian

@StingrayMusic is the Canadian replacement for Spotify or Apple Music.

18 Mar 2026 · 2 min

Watch on YouTube

1:41

In this YouTube review, the speaker introduces Stingray Music, a Montreal‑based, all‑Canadian music streaming service that has been operating for about 20 years. Unlike Spotify and Apple Music, Stingray’s playlists are curated by real human programmers rather than algorithms. The speaker highlights the sheer number of channels—thousands—filterable by decade, mood, genre, and with dedicated Canadian music channels, and points out that listeners can even see the individual curators, such as an 80s New Wave programmer with 35 years of industry experience. Stingray is positioned as a curated radio service, not an on‑demand library, making it ideal for background listening, dinner parties, road trips, or work‑day ambience, though it may not satisfy users seeking specific deep‑cut tracks. The service offers mobile apps, a free tier that still allows song skips, and a premium upgrade (under $4 / month) that provides higher audio quality and unlimited skips—significantly cheaper than typical Spotify plans. The speaker concludes that Stingray is a viable, affordable, Canadian alternative for most everyday listening needs.

Chapters

Replacing the everyday tech we use with Canadian alternatives today. Music apps. I listen to music all day long at work. Thank you, God. And I bounce between Spotify and Apple Music and SiriusXM, but there is an all-Canadian alternative. It's called Stingray. I've been testing it for a couple of weeks and I am ready to report on it. Now you may think you know this as like the cable music station or something, but it is way more than I understood. It's based in Montreal, been around for 20 years. It's doing the thing that Spotify pretends to do, but with actual humans behind it. Stingray music channels are curated by real programmers based in Canada. There's no algorithm deciding your fate. A real person sits down and thought about what song comes after what song. And you can see these people too. Like, I'm always on the '80s New Wave channel, and this guy is the programmer. He's not AI. He's been in the industry for 35 years. He's worked for record labels. There are thousands of curated channels, filterable by decade and mood and genre. And if you're like me and you grew up in the '80s, look at all the options. And they have every kind of Canadian music channel you can imagine. Now, is Stingray gonna replace Spotify for everyone? I mean, probably not for the person who needs to find that one specific Taylor Swift deep cut at 11 o'clock at night. Stingray is curated radio. It's not an on-demand library. But for background music and dinner parties and road trips and working from home and the 3 hours a day that most of us have something playing without really listening, Stingray does a great job. And it does the job from here in Canada. Yes, it has mobile apps. I just use the free version. It sounds great. You can skip songs even in the free plan if you don't like them. And if you wanna If you upgrade to better quality and unlimited skips, it's not even $4 a month. That's a quarter of what Spotify wants from you. So Stingray.com, a better and all-Canadian music site.