Apple Music Now on Android

The tech giant has recently presented an official Android app for its Apple Music streaming service – just 4 months after its debut on its home iOS platform. Core features of the service have survived the translation to Android, including its dedicated playlist and album recommendations, radio station and social network, along with its 3-month free trial for new users.

The Android version of the streaming service also provides people with access to their purchases from Apple’s iTunes download store – this is the first time for Android. Actually, the only missing feature at the moment is the ability to play music videos. When presenting the service this past summer, Apple promised to launch it for Android devices later.

The company explained that the developers have created the new app according to Android’s design principles. The industry observers do not agree on the point why Apple is making such an effort for Android, which they have regularly disparaged publicly for malware and the slower updates. Some of them even believe that it’s just a marketing ploy to lure people towards iOS devices. Others think that Android support will make Apple Music’s family plan more appealing for people whose family members are also using Android devices. But the most popular theory is that Apple was entering the music-streaming market years after key rivals and therefore could not afford to ignore Android with a billion of active users. According to the statistics, the main rivals of Apple Music (Spotify and Pandora) had their Android apps been installed more than 100m times, and Google’s own Google Play Music Android app accounts for 1bn installs.

Last month, Apple announced that 6.5 million people were paying for its music service in the first month after their free trial ended. Even if half of them simply forgot to cancel their automatic subscription, the streaming service would likely be the second biggest (after Spotify) “on-demand” service, ahead of Rhapsody/Napster and Deezer.