Most commercial Atmos music mixes are embellished stereo rather than true multichannel.

Evidence

A revealing investigation by Bourbon et al. (2023) analyzed the 7.1.4 channel-based render of 100 commercially released Atmos mixes hosted in a Hits in Spatial Audio playlist. They determined how much various channels were used for different components of mixes. There are several important findings, but one that stands out is that the majority are really embellished stereo mixes, with little use of the center channel: “Results presented suggest that many Atmos mixes are still primarily driven by the Left-Right speaker pair [i.e. stereo]. This is supported by regular identification of lead vocals, bass, and drums in the Left-Right speaker pair.” — Toole, Floyd E, Sound reproduction- the acoustics and…, 872

Categorization

• SEED: Article angle: the gap between the hype around spatial audio and the actual practice — most ‘immersive’ music is stereo with reverb on top.