After months of waiting, Apple customers can now finally access Apple’s new Music streaming service. Here’s how much you’ll pay.
What Is It?
Apple is replacing the Music app on your iPhone with a new one that gives you access to a bunch of new curated tunes, streaming music and artist interactions.
The whole point of Apple Music is to bring you closer to your tunes on an iOS device, and the whole experience is broken down into a few different sections: My Music, For Me, curated Radio, and Connect.
The My Music interface shows you two columns: the stuff you have added to your library already as well as a playlists section which includes playlists you’ve created for yourself, as well as stuff curated by Apple’s people. When you’re listening to music, you can listen to the stuff in your own library, as well as press “All” to view what else is out there under the same artist or genre.
Next up, is the radio bit. Apple is calling its world-wide 24-hour radio “Beats One,” which is run by famous music DJ guy Zane Lowe. It comes to you love from NYC, LA, and London. Which doesn’t sound quite as global as they’re implying, but let’s see where they go with it down the line.
Finally, comes Apples problem to “Connect” which is basically a way for you to follow your favourite artists on Facebook and Twitter as well as through the app itself. This last bit sounds a bit like Apple’s previous social music failure, Ping. Artists will all have to be verified by Apple before they start posting, so you’ll be able to make sure that posts you’re seeing actually came from the right artist when you view Connect.
How Much?
The best thing about Apple Music is that you don’t have to pay for it immediately. That’s right: Apple is giving everyone a three-month free trial of Music free of charge.
Once that three months expires, however, you’re going to be parting with a bit of cash.
A single membership will cost you $11.99 per month, and gets you access to the entire Apple Music library as well as unlimited skips on radio stations. The single membership will work across your iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, Mac and PC, but only with the one account.
If you want more people to access your account, you’re going to need the $17.99 family membership that allows up to six people to connect their devices.
Apple has actually made the service cheaper in Australia compared to the current exchange rate with the US dollar. Direct conversion means that the service would have been $13 and $22 per month as opposed to $11.99 and $17.99, so thankfully we’re not getting screwed for a change.
How To Get It
Apple Music is only available on iOS 8.4 or with a new version of iTunes.
As is true with most OTA updates, it might take a while for the update to actually be available on your particular iPhone (Settings > General > Software Update or just try through iTunes), but just keep praying to the software update gods.
You can update your iTunes software through the updates menu on Windows, or via the App Store on your Mac.
Are you psyched for Apple Music? Tell us whether you’ll use it in the comments!