Music (also known as Apple Music, the Apple Music app, and the Music app) is a media player application developed for the

iOS Ios, Io or Nio (, ; ; locally Nios, Νιός) is a Greek island in the Cyclades group in the Aegean Sea. Ios is a hilly island with cliffs down to the sea on most sides. It is situated halfway between Naxos and Santorini. It is about long an ...

iPadOS iPadOS is a mobile operating system developed by Apple for its iPad line of tablet computers. It was given a name distinct from iOS, the operating system used by Apple's iPhones to reflect the diverging features of the two product lines, suc ...

macOS macOS, previously OS X and originally Mac OS X, is a Unix, Unix-based operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple since 2001. It is the current operating system for Apple's Mac (computer), Mac computers. With ...

watchOS watchOS is the operating system of the Apple Watch, developed by Apple Inc., Apple. It is based on iOS, the operating system used by the iPhone, and has many similar features. It was released on April 24, 2015, along with the Apple Watch, the o ...

visionOS visionOS is a mixed reality operating system derived primarily from iPadOS and its core frameworks (including UIKit, SwiftUI, ARKit and RealityKit), and MR-specific frameworks for foveated rendering and real-time interaction. It was develope ...

tvOS tvOS (formerly Apple TV Software) is an operating system developed by Apple for the Apple TV, a digital media player. In the first-generation Apple TV, Apple TV Software was based on Mac OS X. The software for the second-generation and later ...

, Android, and

Windows Windows is a Product lining, product line of Proprietary software, proprietary graphical user interface, graphical operating systems developed and marketed by Microsoft. It is grouped into families and subfamilies that cater to particular sec ...

operating systems by

Apple Inc. Apple Inc. is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California, in Silicon Valley. It is best known for its consumer electronics, software, and services. Founded in 1976 as Apple Comput ...

It can play music files stored locally on devices, as well as stream from the iTunes Store and

Apple Music Apple Music is an audio and video streaming service developed by Apple Inc. Users can select music to stream to their device on-demand, or listen to existing playlists. The service also includes the sister internet radio stations Apple Musi ...

. On iPhones and iPads running

iOS 4 iOS 4 is the fourth major release of the iOS mobile operating system developed by Apple Inc., being the successor to iPhone OS 3. It was announced at the Apple Special Event on April 8, 2010, and released on June 21, 2010. iOS 4 was the first ...

or older software, it was named "

iPod The iPod is a series of portable media players and multi-purpose mobile devices that were designed and marketed by Apple Inc. from 2001 to 2022. The iPod Classic#1st generation, first version was released on November 10, 2001, about mon ...

". It was included in the initial releases of tvOS, watchOS, and iPadOS. It was released with

macOS Catalina macOS Catalina (version 10.15) is the sixteenth software versioning, major release of macOS, Apple Inc.'s desktop operating system for Macintosh computers. It is the successor to macOS Mojave and was announced at WWDC 2019 on June 3, 2019 and ...

on October 7, 2019, as one of three applications created to replace

iTunes iTunes is a media player, media library, and mobile device management (MDM) utility developed by Apple. It is used to purchase, play, download and organize digital multimedia on personal computers running the macOS and Windows operating s ...

. The Music app is differentiated from iTunes by its concentration on

streaming media Streaming media refers to multimedia delivered through a Computer network, network for playback using a Media player (disambiguation), media player. Media is transferred in a ''stream'' of Network packet, packets from a Server (computing), ...

and lesser focus on the iTunes Store, where content may be purchased outright.

iOS, tvOS, and watchOS versions

The Music app on iOS was initially released in iPhone OS 1 as the iPod app, and was renamed Music in

iOS 5 iOS 5 is the iOS version history, fifth major release of the iOS mobile operating system developed by Apple Inc., being the successor to iOS 4. It was announced at the company's Worldwide Developers Conference on June 6, 2011, and was released ...

. It was updated with a redesign and functionality for

with iOS 8.4 in 2015. It is a standard app on

CarPlay CarPlay and CarPlay Ultra is an Apple standard that enables a car radio or automotive head unit to be a display and controller for an iOS device. It is available on iPhone 5 and later models running iOS 7.1 or later. More than 800 car and mot ...

. The Music app is available on 2nd and 3rd generation

Apple TV Apple TV is a digital media player and a microconsole developed and marketed by Apple. It is a small piece of networking hardware that sends received media data such as video and audio to a TV or external display. Its media services include ...

s to stream music purchased from the iTunes Store or synced with

iTunes Match iCloud is the personal cloud service of Apple Inc. Launched on October 12, 2011, iCloud enables users to store and sync data across devices, including Apple Mail, Apple Calendar, Apple Photos, Apple Notes, contacts, settings, backups, and ...

, but was never updated with support for Apple Music. Apple Music support was added in the

version on the 4th generation Apple TV in early November 2015. The Music app has been included in every version of

on the

Apple Watch The Apple Watch is a brand of smartwatch products developed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple. It incorporates activity tracker, fitness tracking, Health (Apple), health-oriented capabilities, and wireless telecommunication, and integrates wit ...

. Music can be downloaded directly to an Apple Watch for use without a paired

iPhone The iPhone is a line of smartphones developed and marketed by Apple that run iOS, the company's own mobile operating system. The first-generation iPhone was announced by then–Apple CEO and co-founder Steve Jobs on January 9, 2007, at ...

macOS version

The Music app on macOS was preceded by the

app launched on January 9, 2001. Video support within the iTunes app was enabled in May 2005; podcast and books support followed in June 2005 and January 2010, respectively. By the 2010s, the application had been criticized for

software bloat Software bloat is a process whereby successive versions of a computer program become perceptibly slower, use more memory, disk space or processing power, or have higher hardware requirements than the previous version, while making only dubious ...

with features that extended well beyond the original scope of music. Apple announced at the 2019

Worldwide Developers Conference The Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) is an information technology conference held annually by Apple Inc. The conference is currently held at Apple Park in California. The event is used to showcase new software and technologies in the macO ...

that iTunes would be replaced with the specific Music app, Podcasts, and TV applications with the release of

. Apple describes the Music app as a "music streaming experience," whereas the company described iTunes as a

digital library A digital library (also called an online library, an internet library, a digital repository, a library without walls, or a digital collection) is an online database of digital resources that can include text, still images, audio, video, digital ...

and

online music store A digital music store is a business that sells digital audio files of music recordings over the Internet. Customers gain ownership of a license to use the files, in contrast to a music streaming service, where they listen to recordings withou ...

. Previous iTunes versions designed for older macOS versions, as well as iTunes for

, will remain unaffected. Music, TV shows and movies, and podcasts on the iTunes Store will be accessible through the Music, TV, and Podcasts apps, respectively, compared to the standalone iTunes Store app that is featured on

Android version

The Music app was released for devices running Android Lollipop and later on November 10, 2015, where it is referred to as Apple Music. It marked the first time music from the iTunes Store was available on non-Apple mobile devices since the Rokr E1 during a brief partnership with

Motorola Motorola, Inc. () was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois. It was founded by brothers Paul and Joseph Galvin in 1928 and had been named Motorola since 1947. Many of Motorola's products had been ...

in 2005. This version of the app does not allow access to iTunes Store purchases or iTunes Match, unless the user has an active Apple Music subscription.

Windows version

On January 13, 2023, Apple released a beta version of Apple Music on the

Microsoft Store The Microsoft Store (formerly known as the Windows Store) is a digital distribution platform operated by Microsoft. It was created as an app store for Windows 8 as the primary means of distributing Universal Windows Platform apps. With ...

for

Windows 11 Windows 11 is a version of Microsoft's Windows NT operating system, released on October 5, 2021, as the successor to Windows 10 (2015). It is available as a free upgrade for devices running Windows 10 that meet the #System requirements, Windo ...

, replacing the infrequently updated iTunes for Windows.

References

Notes

{{Apple IOS software WatchOS software MacOS software Apple Inc. software IOS-based software made by Apple Inc. TvOS software