News

YouTube Reveals Music Streaming Service

Avatar photo

17 May 2018

By Alex Khalil

YouTube has announced it will be launching its own music streaming service, offering both videos and audio, in an effort to compete with the likes of Spotify and Apple.  YouTube Music will combine millions of official tracks including remixes and rare songs.

It will offer a paid subscription and a free version. The subscription will cost $9.99 a month and will launch in five countries, including the US and Mexico on 22nd May. The service will be coming to Europe ‘soon’.

Product manager Elias Roman said:

‘The days of jumping back and forth between multiple music apps and YouTube are over. Whether you want to listen, watch or discover, it’s all here.’

He promised the app would offer personalised playlists, curated based on the users’ history. Spotify has a Discover Weekly which acts very similarly. YouTube Music will replace the current Google Play Music app which is the current streaming service that Google offers.

To compete with the likes of Spotify and Apple Music, it will need to garner quite a few subs. Spotify currently has 75 million subscribers and Apple Music has 42 million with a further eight million taking advantage of its free three-month trial.

It’s no coincidence that the same countries that offer YouTube Red are the same countries where the music service will release first.

YouTube Red is also getting a rebrand, being called YouTube Premium, which will include access to YouTube Originals.

Like this article? Please share!