Google‘s new Spotify and Apple Music competitor, YouTube Music launches today. It’s Google’s third attempt to compete in the sector and Global Head of Music Lyor Cohen’s promised reset to generate more revenue for record labels and artists. Here’s what to expect :
1) a “reimagined mobile app and brand new desktop player that are designed for music.”
2) along with the usual millions of tracks, YouTube Music promises thousands of playlists, downloads, intuitive music search – a real problem on Spotify
3) a music hub that takes advantage of YouTube’s plethora of content and brings together remixes, covers and live versions.
4) for $9.99 a month, or the local equivalent, all ads disappear. To encourage users to make the shift to paid – something YouTube’s global head of music Lyor Cohen has promised labels is a priority – the number of ads delivered across the entire service will noticeably increased.
5) Your own personalized homepage could be YouTube’ Music’s big point of differentiation, and it should be a welcome alternative for most music fans. Instead of seeing what Spotify or Apple want you to see when login, YouTube Music will deliver a front page based on your tastes and listening habits. For now that will be based on what videos you’ve watched on YouTube. Buty as you use YouTube Music more, it will shift with your listening patterns.
6) not quite disappearing, but back burnered, is Google Play Music. YouTube Music is now the brand. But a, bit confusingly, Google promises that “if you use Google Play Music, nothing will change – you’ll still be able to access all of your purchased music, uploads and playlists in Google Play Music just like always.”
7) gone for good is YouTube Red – at least as a brand. YouTube Premium combines YouTube Red’s ad free video experience, original programming and offline viewing with YouTube Music for $11.99 per month.
8) At launch YouTube Music will be available in just 4 countries United States, Australia, New Zealand and Mexico. YouTube Premium will also launch in South Korea. Google promises it’s “coming soon” to Austria, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Norway, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK.