Amazon today announced that Apple Music support is coming to its Echo lineup of speakers in the coming weeks, allowing Apple Music subscribers to ask Alexa to stream their favorite songs, artists, albums, and more. Users will also be able to stream Beats 1 live and play any of the curated playlists from Apple Music editors or ask for their preferred algorithmically-generated radio stations.
While you've already been able to stream to your heart's content on your Amazon Echo for some time from services like Spotify, iHeart Radio, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, among others, Apple Music has always been notably absent from the ever-popular Alexa smart speakers.
Dave Limp, senior vice president, Amazon Devices said:
"Music is one of the most popular features on Alexa—since we launched Alexa four years ago, customers are listening to more music in their homes than ever before. We are committed to offering great music providers to our customers and since launching the Music Skill API to developers just last month, we've expanded the music selection on Alexa to include even more top tier services. We're thrilled to bring Apple Music – one of the most popular music services in the US – to Echo customers this holiday."
While making Apple Music available on a competitor's platform may seem counter to Apple's usual hardware-first strategy, the company would be remiss to dismiss Amazon's popular smart speaker platform. Amazon has been pushing hard this holiday season to get more Echo speakers into more homes with steep discounts on its latest Echo and Echo Dot as well as a new range of music focused Echo smart speakers in the Echo Plus and Sub, and the Echo Input which brings Alexa's smarts to your current speaker setup.
Apple has had Apple Music support for Android users since the service launched (and iTunes on Windows long before that) so it is not an unprecedented move. Apple is also focusing on growing its services revenue, and adding Apple Music to Amazon Echo may help expand its subscriber base.
Apple Music will be available on your Echo speakers from December 17.
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