Although Apple Music is my favorite music streaming service, the lack of some basic features is pretty frustrating. Some of these are available in other similar tools, which makes it even more annoying that you can’t access them.
6
Easy Device-Switching for Individual Plans
One of the most perplexing areas in which Apple Music falls short is in the ability to easily switch devices on an individual plan. You can do so with a Family subscription and encounter no issues, but the personal plan is very frustrating.
As soon as you open Apple Music on a different device, you’ll often see a notification saying you can’t play tracks on more than one device. Spotify, meanwhile, makes switching between devices seamless. This is one of the biggest differences between the two apps.
Though Apple Music offers a better experience than Spotify overall, I feel like it could attract even more people from other streaming services with such a simple fix.
5
Device Continuity
Apple Music is pretty bad with device continuity. I listen to music on my smartphone, tablet, and computer, and on each one, a different song appears because it goes based on the most recent one on that particular device. While some people may not find this to be a problem, I think it’s pretty annoying.
Before switching from Spotify to Apple Music, I had no issues continuing to listen to the same track across devices. This was particularly useful when I switched from my phone to my computer, for example.
I also wish Apple Music made it more effortless to control various aspects across multiple devices, such as the volume.
4
Integration With Apple Podcasts
I know Apple Music and Podcasts are two different apps, and I like this for many reasons. It’s nice to be able to open one app or the other when I need to listen to something and not have distractions I didn’t ask for.
But while I think some tools integrate podcasts in a clunky manner, I do think it could work for Apple Music. I would like to have something simple, like a Podcasts tab in the sidebar. By using this, I could easily access my podcast episodes in a less intrusive way than the likes of Spotify’s homepage.
To avoid being too intrusive, Apple Music could consider adding an option allowing users to turn off this feature if they don’t want it.
3
Easier Drag-and-Drop on Desktop
Despite its benefits, Apple Music’s user experience lags behind many other streaming services in several areas. For example, while I found YouTube Music easy to organize and manage, Apple Music’s desktop app still feels somewhat outdated and resembles iTunes too closely.
In particular, I really dislike the drag-and-drop options. On multiple occasions, I’ve accidentally copied and pasted one playlist into another when I just wanted to reshuffle their positions. This is incredibly annoying, especially when I accidentally copy and paste 100+ songs.
I’d like a simple option where I can shuffle my playlists around, and I don’t think this would be hard to implement. I see it working in the same way that you can move songs on your queue in the iPhone and iPad apps.
2
Better Playlist Discoverability
If I have been critical of Apple Music in one area, especially, it’s how much worse it is than Spotify at discovering other people’s playlists. Yes, you can find what other people have published via the search function, but your options aren’t as widespread as Spotify.
I also feel like Apple Music lacks playlist discoverability in general. You can search by genre, but it’s not as good at pulling out anything that doesn’t include specific keywords. Even Spotify Discover Weekly needs changes, but not on the same level as Apple Music.
I’d expect this to take at least a few years for Apple to implement, but it would be worthwhile. Besides making it easier to discover new songs, better playlist discoverability could be another reason to switch for people sitting on the fence.
1
The Play Later Feature
Apple Music used to have a Play Later feature, which allowed you to queue songs you wanted to listen to later but not immediately. This made it a bit different from the Play Next feature, which—as the name suggests—would queue your song up next.
Unfortunately, Apple removed this feature without much notice. While you can still rearrange songs within the queue, it requires more manual work than previously. As a result, it makes the in-app experience much less enjoyable.
While I don’t think it will happen, I’d like Apple Music to bring back this feature. Doing so would make it easier to queue songs later that I’m not yet ready to listen to, but will at some point.
Apple Music is still the best music streaming service, but it needs several in-app changes. Easier drag-and-drop usability on desktop would be nice, as would better device continuity. These adjustments would be easy to make and make a significant difference.
