Steve PMHApple Music is the fastest-growing audio streaming service in the world.
In just six months, it amassed over 10 million paying subscribers worldwide—a feat that took Spotify over seven years to achieve.
Today, Apple Music boasts a whopping 100 million paying subscribers, making it the second-biggest music streaming platform in the world.
But what is Apple Music, really, and is it worth paying for?
Let’s find out!
What Is Apple Music?
Apple Music was officially launched in 2015, following the company’s acquisition of Beats Electronic in 2014.
It works much like Spotify and other music streaming services, but better: it not only lets you stream music on-demand from the iTunes catalog but also gives you access to all your iPhone’s audio files in one place.
It’s basically an all-in-one music player.
Brief History of Apple Music
Launched in 2015, Apple Music is an all-in-one music streaming service that combines the largest and most diverse music collection in a single, easy-to-access app.
Apple Music is available in all of Apple’s products, including the iPhone, iPad, Apple TV, iPod touch, and Mac.
Android users weren’t left out, either; although mostly targeted toward Apple users, the app works perfectly on Samsung and other Android phones.
The Beginning
Jimmy Iovine, the founder of Apple Music, brought the Apple Music idea to life in an effort to make listening to music less complicated.
Instead of using separate apps, services, and websites to listen to and download your favorite music, Iovine and his team launched the Apple Music app so your entire music catalog is an arm’s length away.
Unsurprisingly, the Apple Music app received an overwhelmingly positive response from its loyal consumers. From its first week of launch, millions of people have subscribed to the service.
To further sweeten the deal, Apple Music offered a three-month trial to “test” the service for free.
The company also launched promotional offers and bundles that feature Apple Music as a special add-on.
Controversy
Everything was going according to plan. Apple Music’s subscription count was rising at a rapid pace, and albums were selling like hotcakes.
But with success, controversy shortly followed. A few days after the app’s release, singer-songwriter Taylor Swift wrote an open letter to the public.
In the letter, she criticized Apple’s decision to not reimburse artists during the app’s three-months trial period.
“Three months is a long time to go unpaid, and it is unfair to ask anyone to work for nothing,” she said. Apple’s response was prompt.
The very next day, Eddy Cue, Apple’s Senior Vice President of Services, announced on Twitter that Apple Music will pay artists for streaming, even during the customer’s free trial period.
Growth
In January 2016, a mere six months after the app’s launch, Apple Music reached 10 million paying subscribers. This number doubled by December 2016, reaching 20 million subscribers.
By 2018, Apple Music has surpassed the paying users of its biggest competitor, Spotify.
Present Day
Today, Apple Music is one of the biggest music streaming apps in the industry.
With a catalog of 90 million tracks and over 110 million paying subscribers, it’s hailed as the second-most used music streaming service in the world, despite there being no “freemium” subscription.
How Does Apple Music Work? Functions and Features
Apple Music works much like every other music streaming service out there, with a lot of emphasis on its radio stations and curated playlists.
Here are some of the features and functions you can expect with Apple Music:
Massive Library of Songs
Apple Music has a library of over 90 million songs (and growing), so you’ll likely always find the song you want to listen to. In comparison, Spotify only has around 82 million tracks.
All 90 million + songs use ALAC (Apple Lossless Audio Codec) to preserve the original quality of the song’s recording.
Top Tier Sound Quality
As part of the iOS 14 launch on September 16, 2020, Apple converted millions of tracks into spatial audio format, which pairs brilliantly with the new AirPods Max headphones.
A year later, in the spring of 2021, Apple Music added spatial audio support for surround sound technologies, with the most notable being Dolby Atmos Music.
Dolby Atmos tracks automatically play on Beats headphones and AirPods with H1 or W1 chipsets, as well as the speakers on the newest iPhones, iPads, and Macs. Spacial Audio also works on selected Android devices.
In the same year, Apple introduced lossless audio across its entire catalog of over 90 million songs.
Instead of just the standard quality, the songs found in the Apple Music catalog start at 16-bit at 44.1kHz and go up to 24 bit at 48kHz (or 2304 kbit/s).
To put that into perspective, Spotify tops out at only 320 kbit/s.
For true audiophiles, Apple Music has a Hi-Res Lossless tier option of 24 bit at 192 kHz, but this option requires an external digital-to-analog converter (DAC) to achieve.
Hyper-Customization
As much as I love Spotify, Spotify’s customization doesn’t hold a candle to that of Apple Music.
As soon as you log into the app, you’ll be met with a tab that gives you a selection of multiple genres, artists, and stations.
It also has a “New” tab that lists the newest of the new from all known genres every week, as picked by Apple’s top editors.
On top of that, Apple Music offers the week’s “Recent Releases,” “Top Songs,” and “Hot Tracks” across all styles of music.
But that’s not all. Apple Music doesn’t limit itself to clear-cut genres; it also curates music based on mood and activity.
Under Classic Rock, for example, you’ll find categories called, “Feelin’ Fine,” “Dark Sky,” and “Wax Eclectic.”
You’ll also find tracks under “Studying,” “Partying,” “Relaxation,” “Breaking Up,” and “BBQing,” among others.
24/7 Radio
Apple Music 1 is Apple’s version of Spotify Radio.
Formerly Beats 1, Apple Music 1 is a 24/7 music radio station that regularly airs a mix of rap, pop, and indie music.
It’s one of the largest online radio stations in the world, with millions of daily listeners across 150+ countries.
The 24-hour radio show has a rotating schedule of 12 hours of live performances and 12 hours of repeating content.
Aside from Apple Music 1, Apple Music has two other radio stations: Apple Music Hits and Apple Music Country.
The Hits channel focuses on the top hits of the last four decades, with rotating guest hosts like Alanis Morissette and Snoop Dogg.
Apple Music Country focuses on American country music and its many micro-genres, including old-time, bluegrass, country pop, Christian country, and the like.
All three radio channels can be accessed on the Apple Music app.
Simply tap on the “Radio” button at the bottom of your phone screen or on the sidebar on your computer, and select the radio station of your liking.
If you’re not fond of what’s playing on three of Apple’s stations, you can actually listen to the radio from your local stations.
Scroll down and click “See All” in the Local Broadcasters section, and select the station you want to listen to from there.
Siri Assistance
Apple made it easy for Apple Music users to play songs through the Siri function.
There’s little Siri can’t do; ask Siri to “play this week’s top songs,” “play more songs like this,” or even, “add the new [artist] album to my library.”
You can even ask her to automatically play a song at a certain time or plan music for lunch, for example.
Here are some of the common functions Siri can do:
- Play a song, artist, or album
- Play hits from a genre or decade
- Play music based on your mood
- Play music based on your activity
- Play a personalized playlist
- Add music to your library or playlist
- Find out what’s currently playing (“Hey Siri, what album is this on?” Or, “Hey Siri, what’s the name of this song?”
- Stop, pause, play, or repeat a song
- Turn up the volume of the song
Access to Exclusive Original Content
Apple Music regularly releases never-seen behind-the-scenes content for your favorite artists.
Furthermore, Apple Music is known to release exclusive albums from popular artists such as Drake, Britney Spears, Future, Frank Ocean, Taylor Swift, and more.
It also has ad-free video content, exclusive music videos, live shows, and TV events with special guests.
In-Depth Search Functionality
Apple Music outshines almost every audio streaming service with its in-depth search functionality.
For example, its “Search by Lyrics” feature is much more refined than Spotify’s. Upon typing the lyrics on the search bar, Apple Music will present you with a list of songs with small excerpts.
You can also ask Siri to identify a song by saying, “What song is this?” and then singing the song you’re looking for.
Offline Song Playback
Offline song playback isn’t exclusive to Apple Music; in fact, most audio streaming services offer offline listening and download.
However, Apple Music gives users the option to automatically download any and all songs you add to your library.
This way, you’ll always have access to your favorite songs even when you lose internet access or when it’s glitching out.
To activate this feature, go to your Settings, tap Music, then turn on “Automatic Downloads.”
How Much Does Apple Music Cost?
Unlike most music streaming platforms out there, Apple Music doesn’t have a free, ad-supported subscription. If it did, it’ll undoubtedly surpass Spotify.
It’s not that much of a surprise, though; Apple rarely gives out “freebies.” All of its services cost money.
As it currently stands, Apple Music costs $9.99 a month or $99 a year for individual subscriptions. For students, it costs a modest $4.99 a month.
Apple Music also has a six-account Family Plan for $14.99—cheaper than Spotify’s at $15.99.
Apple also has a Voice Plan for only $4.99 a month.
The Voice Plan is a cheaper alternative to the standard plan; the only difference is that you have to use Siri to play your songs.
You won’t be able to manually add songs to your playlists, view song lyrics while a song is playing, or organize your “Up Next” queue.
It also doesn’t support Apple’s higher-tier audio formats, like lossless audio and spatial audio, thereby limiting the full features of AirPods.
Still, the Voice Plan is an excellent choice for casual listeners who don’t want to open the Apple Music app every time they want to listen to a song.
Does the Apple One Bundle Include Apple Music?
Apple One is an all-in-one Apple subscription that gives you full access to some of Apple’s top services—including Apple Music.
Currently, there are three tiers available: Individual, Family, and Premier.
Individual Plan
As the name suggests, the Individual Plan is targeted toward individual users. For only $14.99 a month, you get access to the following Apple services:
- Apple Music: Originally $9.99
- Apple Arcade: Originally $4.99
- Apple TV+: Originally $4.99
- iCloud storage, 50GB: Originally $0.99
With this plan, you save approximately $6 a month if you’re already subscribed to Apple’s game, TV, and music services.
Family Plan
The Family Plan gives you access to six individual accounts for the following services:
- Apple Music Family: Originally $14.99
- Apple Arcade: Originally $4.99
- Apple TV+: Originally $4.99
- iCloud storage, 200GB: Originally $2.99 a month
The Family Plan costs $19.99 a month, saving you approximately $8 a month if you were to pay for the above services individually.
Premium Plan
If you depend on Apple’s services a lot, the Premium Plan is your best choice. In this plan, you get full access to the following subscriptions:
- Apple Music Family: Originally $14.99
- Apple News+: Originally $9.99
- Apple Arcade: Originally $4.99
- Apple TV+: Originally $4.99
- Apple Fitness+: Originally $9.99
- iCloud storage, 2TB: Originally $9.99 a month
Instead of paying around $55 for the above-mentioned services, you only pay $29.99 for the Apple One plan.
Can You Still Use the Apple Music App Without a Subscription?
In 2019, Apple replaced iTunes Music—iPhone’s main media player—with Apple Music.
This left a lot of users worried, especially since most of Apple Music’s major features don’t work without a subscription.
Luckily, you can still use Apple Music as a media player without paying for a subscription.
It lets you listen to the music you’ve purchased, uploaded, or ripped into your device at no extra cost.
It also lets you play all music you’ve uploaded to your iCloud, and listen to ad-supported Apple Stations such as Apple Music 1.
Subscribing to Apple Music unlocks a ton of noteworthy features, though, such as ad-free listening, unlimited skips, Apple Music radio stations, and full access to a massive library of over 90 million tracks.
You’ll also receive song recommendations based on your activity and save songs to your library for offline listening.
Does Apple Music Work on the Apple Watch? If So, How?
If you own an Apple Watch, you’ll be glad to know that you can easily listen to your favorite music (and podcasts) directly on your Apple Watch.
Simply connect your Bluetooth headphones, earphones, or speakers to your watch and play music from there.
The Apple Watch has average storage of 8GB. Of the 8GB, you can use around 2GB of storage for songs.
This roughly translates to around 400 to 500 songs—more than enough for your daily runs and workouts.
Here’s how to sync Apple Music to your Apple Watch:
Place your Apple Watch and your iPhone within close range. To prevent the watch from dying during syncing, plug it into its charger.
On your iPhone, open your Settings app and scroll down until you find the Bluetooth option.
- Tap the Bluetooth option to turn it on.
- Exit the Settings tab and open the Apple Watch app.
- In the Apple Watch app, tap My Watch.
- Scroll down until you find Music.
- On the Music tab, click on Add Music. From there, you’ll be given access to all Apple Music songs and albums.
- Tap the songs and albums you want to add to your Apple Watch.
- When the music is done syncing, go to the Music app on your Watch. The playlist/songs you’ve synced should appear in the app.
Is Apple Music Worth It?
If you’re an avid iPhone user and regularly listen to music, Apple Music is more than worth the price.
While there’s certainly no shortage of music streaming services out there, Apple Music brings a lot of features to the table—including spatial sound, high-quality audio, and exclusive music releases among others.
You also get 24/7 access to Apple Music radio stations.
And if that doesn’t convince you, maybe Apple’s massive library of 90 million songs will. Apple Music’s biggest competitor, Spotify, only has 82 million.
Unfortunately, Apple Music doesn’t have an ad-supported version like Spotify. If you want to access Apple’s library of music, you have to pay a monthly subscription fee.
So, if you’re not willing to pay $9.99 a month for ad-free listening, you might want to go with alternative audio streaming platforms like Spotify, Pandora, and Amazon Music.
