Key Takeaways
- Apple Music Voice was the cheapest plan on Apple Music, costing $5 per month and allowing users to stream music through voice commands to Siri.
- Apple has announced that they will be phasing out Apple Music Voice, and subscribers will be notified about their options to switch to other Apple Music plans.
- Competitors like Spotify and YouTube have also raised their prices, and Apple Music’s decision to discontinue the cheaper plan may be motivated by a desire to maximize revenues.
The cheapest plan on Apple Music is no longer – Apple Music Voice, which entailed an experience-driven less by a visual app and more through voice commands to Siri, is being phased out. What’s going on, what are existing customers to do now, and what does this mean for people who want to get into the pool?
What was Apple Music Voice?
Apple Music Voice was introduced in 2021 as the service’s most affordable plan, costing only $5 per month to the standard individual plan’s $10 (later $11) monthly. In short, subscribers could stream Apple Music’s full catalog of 90 million or so songs but had to navigate through a slimmed-down Apple Music app that only fed suggestions. If users wanted to search for tracks, they had to do so through voice commands to Siri. Music discovery isn’t as easy with this plan, but if you knew what you were looking for, you could probably get to it with the right words.
What’s happening to Apple Music Voice?
On November 1, Apple declared it would be phasing out the Apple Music Voice plan. The company attempted to explain its decision in a statement posted in its support directories:
We are focused on delivering the best, most robust music experience possible for our customers, with features like immersive Spatial Audio, Apple Music Sing with real-time lyrics, intuitive browse and discovery features, and so much more. All Apple Music plans already work seamlessly with Siri, and we will continue to optimize this experience.
Apple says Apple Music will still be available through Siri.
What’s happening with Apple Music Voice subscribers?
November marks the last billing cycle for Apple Music Voice subscribers. Auto-renewals will be turned off, and customers will be notified about their options to switch to other Apple Music plans, including Student ($6/mo), Individual ($11/mo), and Family ($17/mo). Apple One bundles Apple Music along with Apple TV+, Apple Arcade, and iCloud+ starting at $20/mo.
If you’re in the middle of a free trial for Apple Music Voice, you will have the option to continue on for your first (and only) month of service at the rate of $5.
What’s up with streaming plan pricing?
It’s all going up. Competitors Spotify and YouTube, which offers YouTube Music Premium, pushed their own price hikes in July. Apple Music actually kicked off this wave all the way back in October 2022. All three services now have individual plans priced at $11 per month instead of $10.
All three services do offer a student tier with varying levels of discounting, but only Apple Music provides what could be called a function-limited tier at a greater discount. It was also not affected by the October 2022 price hikes. It’s likely that Apple saw it wasn’t making as much money as it could be from the plan’s subscriber base versus even retaining a fraction of that base at the standard plan’s price.
That said, not all the numbers will make sense when it comes to maximizing revenues: Netflix infamously began cracking down on account sharing this year, and while it was able to generate a short spike of new memberships, the outlook for whether those new payers will stick around is more uncertain.
Trending Products
