Dolby Atmos surround sound

Take surround sound to a whole new three-dimensional level

- Carrie Marshall

Chances are you’ve experienced Dolby Atmos without even knowing it: the technology was launched in 2012 and is used in thousands of cinemas. It’s also part of the Dolby Cinema home theatre format.

Dolby Atmos is a way of delivering incredibly accurate, lifelike audio. It’s mainly used in films but it can do amazing things in music too: REM’s recently remastered Automatic For The People was also remixed for Dolby Atmos with what singer Michael Stipe described as “breathtaking” results.

Dolby Atmos takes surround sound to the next level, quite literally. Where traditional surround sound systems put audio in front, beside and behind you, Dolby Atmos puts it above you too. For example, let’s say you’re watching a film where bullets are flying overhead. With normal surround sound, the sound of those bullets will come from left, right, front or back – but it won’t come from above you. With Dolby Atmos, it does.

Dolby Atmos isn’t audio. It’s information about the audio, information that takes the existing audio data and tells the app or device what to do with it. For now, Dolby Atmos sits on top of two different kinds of surround sound audio: Dolby TrueHD, which is only currently used on Blu-ray Discs, and Dolby Digital Plus, which is used by streaming services and on devices such as Apple TV. If your device or app understands Dolby Atmos it’ll read the data and deliver the Dolby Atmos experience. If it doesn’t, it’ll deliver standard surround sound.