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18 tips to make you an Apple Music master
Apple Music wants to replace Spotify and every other music subscription service, and because it comes preinstalled on every iPhone — and is included with the latest software update — Apple has a huge leg up on the competition.
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It also has a shiny new 24-hour internet radio station called Beats 1. Streaming specific songs on demand with Apple Music will cost $10 per month, but Beats 1 is free for everyone.
Apple is offering a three-month free trial this summer to try to get people hooked on Apple Music.
Here are 18 of the best tips and tricks to get the most out of Apple's new service while you try it out.
While there's unfortunately no easy way to bring over full Spotify playlists to Apple Music, a tool called STAMP will scan your Spotify library and add all of your music to Apple Music's main library.
This means that you'll have the songs from your Spotify playlists available in your Apple Music library, but you'll have to recreate your playlists manually.
STAMP also supports rival music subscription services Rdio and Deezer.
STAMP is free to use, but it only lets you import up to 10 songs at once without paying 5 € (about $5.44) to fully unlock its functionality. You can download STAMP on this website, and it's available for Mac and Windows.
When you first open Apple Music, you're given the option to pick which music genres and artists you like. Apple uses these picks to help present you with playlist suggestions.
You tap each bubble to like it and get more like it, but you can also double tap to love a bubble. So if you really like a certain artist or genre, double tap it to get similar recommendations.
Did you know you can add more kinds of music you like whenever you want in Apple Music? To refine your playlist recommendations even more, head on over to your account window at the top left of the screen.
Then go to "Choose Artists For You" and start tapping more bubbles!
Connect is sort of like a social network that artists can use to "connect" with fans.
When you first set up Apple Music, your account automatically follows artists on Connect if you've purchased their music in the iTunes Store.
That can be nice, but chances are you don't want to be following some random artist you bought a single from five years ago. To unfollow artists, head over to the "Following" section of the account window.
Once you unfollow an artist, their content won't show up in the Connect section of Apple Music.
If you'd rather not use Connect in Apple Music, you can turn it off completely in your iPhone's Settings app.
Go to General and then Restrictions in Settings and flip off the Connect toggle. Now the Connect tab in the Music app will be replaced with a list of your playlists.
Another thing you should do in the account window is claim your @ nickname for Apple Music. You can a add a profile picture from your camera roll.
Your nickname is used for when you comment on anything an artist shares in Connect. So if you leave a comment on a video, everyone will see your @ nickname and photo.
It's easy to like tracks directly from the iPhone's lock screen. Liking songs helps improve the music Apple recommends to you.
Apple Music makes it pretty straightforward to like songs and playlists, but did you know you easily tell it what you don't like too?
While there isn't a way to "thumbs down" individual tracks like you can on Pandora, you can tap and hold on recommended playlists and albums in the "For You" section of Apple Music and tap "I don't like this suggestion."
Apple Music will learn from what you don't like and stop suggesting similar songs in the future.
Want to listen to music when you don't have a cellular or WiFi connection? Apple Music lets you save songs for offline listening, which means it stores the tracks on your iPhone locally instead of streaming them from the cloud.
Tap the three dots at the bottom right while listening to a song or album that's saved to your music, and you'll see the option to make available offline. You'll see a progress bar in the main My Music tab as the app downloads the songs onto your device.
In the "My Music" section of the app, you may not be able to see all of the tracks you've saved. If that's the case, it's because you have the app set to show you only music that's been stored for offline listening.
To fix this, tap the label that sorts your music by artist, album, song, etc. At the bottom you'll see a toggle for "Show Music Available Offline." Make sure that's turned off to see what's saved as streaming and offline tracks together.
Tap the little clock icon in the search bar to quickly see what you've searched already.
If you don't want Apple automatically charging you $9.99 per month once your three-month trial is over, you need to turn off subscription auto-renewal.
Go back to the account view at the top left of the screen and tap "View Apple ID." Sign into your account with your password and go to "Manage" under subscriptions. Tap Apple Music and untoggle "Automatic Renewal."
You can also change to a family plan in this window.
Beats 1 radio is a live broadcast that's led by three DJs in Los Angeles, New York City, and London. They are the backbone of the station and will be live nearly every day.
But there's a ton of special programming, such as exclusive interviews with famous artists like Eminem and round table shows with others like Pharrell and Justin Timberlake.
You can view the Beats 1 schedule in your time zone directly within the "Radio" section of Apple Music and on the service's official Tumblr page.
If you're annoyed by the DJs on Beats 1 constantly talking over the music, you'll be glad to know that most of the shows have their playlists made available later for listening.
Tap the giant Beats 1 logo in the Radio section of the Music app, and scroll down to see a list of all of the station's reoccurring shows. Tap on a show to see recent playlists, organized by date. Now enjoy on-demand listening without hearing "always on!" and "worldwide" every 30 seconds.
If you haven't updated iTunes on your desktop or laptop to the latest version that includes Apple Music, you can't stream Beats 1 in its own tab.
But you can still technically listen to Apple's 24-hour radio station by adding its URL. In the old iTunes Radio section of the app, click the plus symbol next to "My Stations." Search for Beats 1, and you'll be able to add it like any other internet radio station.
Beats 1 sometimes takes listener requests like an old school radio station.
You can call in using these numbers:
- US AND WORLD: +1 (310) 299-8756
- US TOLL FREE: +1 (877) 720-6293
- CANADA TOLL FREE: +1 855-648-0703
- UK TOLL FREE: +44 800 802 1238
- FRANCE: +33 9 75 18 21 60
- JAPAN: +81 3-4589-5123
- GERMANY: +49 1573 5982361
- BRAZIL: +55 11 4950-1098
- MEXICO: +52 81 4170 3626
- DOMINICAN REPUBLIC: +1 829-956-5158
- AUSTRALIA: +61 2 8294 5836
- ITALY: +39 02 9475 1288
- IRELAND: +353 76 680 5749
- NEW ZEALAND: +64 9-887 8360
Or you can just send an iMessage with your request to beats1radio@icloud.com.
Once a song is saved to your "My Music" tab in Apple Music, you can use it as an alarm in Apple's Clock app.
When you're editing an alarm, tap the song option and then "Pick a Song." There you can view and search for any track in your library and set it as the alarm.
Apple Music plays well with Siri, which means you can use the voice assistant to play individual songs, playlists, and albums.
It's actually a lot smarter than you would think. For instance, you can ask to play the hits from a given year and Apple Music will open a relevant playlist. Experiment with different requests and see what works!
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