YouTube Music (commonly abbreviated as YT Music) is an audio streaming service platform, developed by Youtube, a subsidiary of Google. It provides a bespoke interface for the music streaming-oriented service, allowing users to browse music videos on Youtube based on genres, playlists, and recommendations.
The service also offers a level, which allows for ad-free playback, audio-only background playback, and downloading songs for offline playback. These benefits are also available to Google Play Music and YouTube Premium subscribers.
The service eventually replaced Google Play Music as Google’s primary service for streaming and buying music.
Historical of YouTube Music
YouTube Music was unveiled in October 2015 and released the following month. Its release came alongside the unveiling of YouTube Premium (previously known as YouTube Red), a more extensive subscription service that covers the entire platform, including the audio streaming service YouTube Music. Although redundant with Google’s existing Google Play Music subscription service, the app is designed for users who primarily consume songs on Youtube.
On May 17, 2018, the company announced a new version of YouTube Music, including a redesigned desktop player and mobile app, more dynamic recommendations based on various factors, and the use of Google’s artificial intelligence technology to search for songs based on lyrics and descriptions. In addition, the platform has become a separate subscription service (positioned as a more direct competitor to Apple Music and Spotify), offering ad-free and background streaming (audio only), as well as downloading for offline playback of music content on Youtube. The benefits of the service will continue to be available as part of the existing YouTube Premium (formerly YouTube Red) service and to Google Play Music subscribers. The subscription is charged €9. 99 per month like its competitors. The price of YouTube Premium was simultaneously increased to €11. 99 for new subscribers.
In 2018, YouTube Music entered into numerous sponsorship agreements with Dick Clark Productions to partner on its Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve television specials and the American Music Awards.
On April 18, 2019, YouTube Music becomes available on Google Assistant smart speakers (including Google Nest smart speakers), with alimited playback by advertising available to non-subscribers in only a limited number of countries.
Characteristics
Music availability includes many releases from mainstream artists and extends to any video classified as songs on the YouTube service.
YouTube Music initially worked in parallel with Google Play Music, but the latter was completely shut down in October 2020. Product manager Elias Roman said in 2018 that he aims to achieve feature parity with Google Play Music before migrating users to it.
In September 2019, YouTube Music replaced Google Play Music in the main set of Google Mobile Services distributed on new Android devices In May 2020, an update was released to allow imports from Google Play Music, including purchased songs, playlists, cloud libraries, and recommendations. The service still contains regressions on Google Play Music, including no online music store features (unable to buy songs), and a Premium subscription is required to stream the cloud library speakers to Google Nest smart speakers.
Subscriptions
YouTube Music Premium subscribers can enjoy millions of ad-free tracks and videos, background playback in audio-only mode, the ability to download content so they can then listen without a connection and listen to their music on Google Home and Chromecast Audio devices. The free version usually plays the songs in its music video versions, if any. The Premium version plays the official tracks of the album unless the user searches for the version of the music video. The free version does not allow audio-only mode with background playback as it displays video ads. As of November 2020, subscription availability is available in 95 territories on Earth.
| Subscriptions | Advertisements | Jump | Offline mode | Background playback | Audio quality |
| Free | Yes | Unlimited | YouTube Go only | Unavailable | 128 kbit/s |
| Premium | No | Unlimited | Available | Available | 256 kbit/s |
| YouTube Premium | No | Unlimited | Available | Available | 256 kbit/s |
YouTube Premium and YouTube Music Premium offers are available in individual and family variants. A family plan allows up to six family members from the same household to access the plan’s features. Eligible students can get a discount on an individual package.
YouTube Music Premium Subscription While Traveling
YouTube Premium and YouTube Music Premium users can have access to all the benefits of the music library service. Even in territories beyond the reach of the paid subscription, downloads remain available offline for 30 days and music content remains available for 6 months.
Abroad, paid subscription benefits like offline, ad-free listening and background playback are only accessible in the YouTube Music app and are currently incompatible with other apps and services.
Features
As of October 28, 2020, the YouTube Music service is available in 95 countries. It is accessible via a mobile application and a website.
The service allows users to browse and stream all music-oriented videos on YouTube. Music availability includes many releases from mainstream artists and extends to any video classified as music on the service. Songs are streamed via their music videos, if applicable. YouTube Music Premium subscribers can switch to audio-only mode, which can be played in the background when the app is not in use.
The platform will initially run in parallel with Google Play Music, but product manager Elias Roman said Google Play Music users will eventually migrate to YouTube Music once parity is achieved (including adding features such as buying a library for user-provided music). T. Jay Fowler, YouTube Music’s product manager, said collections, playlists and preferences will be migrated.
YouTube Music’s geographic availability
As of November 3, 2020, the YouTube service is available in 95 different territories on Earth:
American Samoa, Argentina, Aruba, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Belgium, Bermuda, Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Cayman Islands,Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Estonia, Finland, France, Guyana, French Polynesia, Germany, Greece, Guadeloupe, Guam, Guatemala, Hong Kong, Honduras, Hungary, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Kuwait, Latvia, Lebanon, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macau, Malta, Malaysia, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Nigeria, North Macedonia, Norway, Northern Mariana Islands, Oman, South Africa, Panama, Papua New Guinea, Paraguay, Peru,Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Qatar, Romania, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Korea , Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Turkey, Turks and Caicos Islands, Thailand, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, the United States, Virgin Islands of United States, Uruguay and Venezuela.
Some provinces and territories do not support YouTube’s paid subscriptions, even if the home country such as metropolitan France is listed in geographic availability.
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