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Reminder: Your Google Play Music library will be deleted later this month
You'll get one final email warning before Google pulls the plug
At the end of its long-drawn-out retirement, Google finally shuttered Play Music in December, passing the baton on to YouTube Music. There's still some time to transfer your music library to the new service, but the deadline is fast approaching. You only have a couple of weeks before all your Play Music data goes away for good.
These are the best replacements for Play Music's upload library
Spoiler alert: None of them replicate Play Music's feature set 1:1
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Google killed Play Music in October 2020, a service many people loved for one feature in particular: its online music file locker with uploaded songs that seamlessly integrated with Play Music's streaming catalog. You could also just add titles you own and listen to them without ever having to pay a dime. Luckily, there are a few alternatives that replicate some of Play Music's capabilities, including its successor YouTube Music.
YouTube Music proves Google cares more about Apple Watch than its own Wear OS platform
Starting today you can use YouTube Music on your Apple Watch, but you still can't on Wear OS
Google has just announced the launch of a YouTube Music app for the Apple Watch. For folks keeping score at home, that means the streaming service all Google Music users are being forced to migrate to has debuted support for Apple's wearable platform before Google's own Wear OS. This makes the company's priorities pretty clear from where we're standing.
Sonos doubles down on battle with Google, files second lawsuit with new claims
It looks like a friendly settlement is off the table
Legal battles between companies are destined to either play out in a settlement very quickly as each side comes to terms with the expense and ultimate lose-lose nature of a drawn out fight; or they go barreling down a path that costs everybody in the long run. The rumble between Sonos and Google looked like it may simmer down, but a new lawsuit filed by Sonos this week may push the situation to the boiling point.
Google Play Music Manager for Windows is already shutting down
Migrate or or pull down those uploads while you can
Google Play Music's death date here in the US is set for just next month. But ahead of that eventual expiration, Google has started shutting down the Music Manager desktop application for managing your Play Music uploads, as it promised earlier this year. A notification going out now tells users that it's no longer available.
YouTube Music to let free tier users cast uploaded songs to smart speakers
This will go some way to placating former Google Play Music users
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After years of playing catch-up with Google Play Music, YouTube Music finally got the ability to let you upload your purchased song library in March. However, that much-requested addition comes with a caveat: You need a premium subscription to cast your songs to smart speakers, which extends even to the ones you uploaded. Some findings by 9to5Google indicate that Google is planning to fix this soon enough.
Google will convert gifted Play Music subscriptions into Play Store credit
And that's plus a YouTube Music sub for the same period, apparently
Folks using gifted Play Music subscriptions don't need to worry about the unused balance of those gift subs when the service dies in September. Google is apparently giving them double the value (or more) by converting those subs over to YouTube Music while also carrying over the unused portion of those subscriptions into Google Play credit — and the math for that last bit heavily favors the customer.
Play Music is dying, and some people still can't make YouTube Music their default provider in Assistant
Proper Assistant voice control is also unavailable for some
Play Music will disappear over the next few months, starting with South Africa and New Zealand in September and the rest of the world following in October. While YouTube Music (YTM) is already an almost full-fledged (albeit quirky) replacement in the US and many parts of Europe, the same can't be said for some other countries. In some, YTM isn't available as a default music provider in the Assistant, and there's no proper voice control for Google's latest streaming service, either.
The signs have been there for months, but now we know for sure that Google Play Music will be discontinued starting September in favor of YouTube Music (YTM). Fans of the older streaming service will tell you that the newcomer has a long way to go before it's as functional and featured, and nothing will change that — not even Google's announcement that YTM has seen some improvements on Google Assistant and Android TV. As expected, those are botched implementations.
Google Play Music will be discontinued starting September
And the Play Store will stop selling music in late August
A while ago, Google announced it would discontinue Play Music this year. The company promised to work hard on making YouTube Music a viable alternative, and it looks like it's now happy with what the new app has become. As such, Google shared today that it will discontinue Play Music starting this September.
YouTube Music rolls out Recent Activity and external devices toggle from Play Music
Closing the gap a couple features at a time
YouTube Music still doesn't have feature parity with Google Play Music, but the list of remaining discrepancies has been dwindling. Two more items can be checked off in the last few days as the Recent Activities list appears to roll out to everybody and you can now control whether devices like wired headsets and bluetooth stereos can trigger playback.
YouTube Music shows latest library additions for some
Bringing YouTube Music more in line with Play Music
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- Updated to reflect the name change from "Last played" to "Recent activity," as pointed out by P3dRo in the comments (Thanks!).
YouTube Music is slated to replace Google Play Music later this year. There are still some discrepancies and missing features, and Google is hard at work bringing over as much functionality to its new music streaming service as it deems feasible and necessary. As such, YouTube Music now tests displaying albums and playlists that you've saved to your library in the Last Played overview.
How to transfer your uploaded songs on Google Play Music to YouTube Music
Get familiar with the new streaming service before Play Music dies later this year
Google announced a migration tool for taking your library from Google Play Music library of uploaded songs and getting them onto its new YouTube Music service back in May. Now, it's rapidly becoming more widely available across the globe. It's not immediately intuitive what the tool will and won't preserve, though, and the benefits and drawbacks of taking your cloud music library over to Google's new music streaming platform. In this guide, we'll show you the ins and outs of the tool and everything you need to know about using it.
YouTube Music migration from Google Play Music is breaking the YouTube sidebar for some
There is a solution, but it's not particularly desirable
Last month, Google began rolling out a transfer tool to help users migrate seamlessly from Google Play Music to YouTube Music. It's a one-click process that syncs your library, recommendations, playlists, likes and dislikes, and more. However, as is often the case with new tech like this, many users are experiencing a glitch, reporting that the migration of their data is causing their YouTube side panel to disappear on both desktop and mobile.
Google delays YouTube Music transfers due to 'high demand'
Another sign that everything is A-okay with Google's music streaming products
Google's long-awaited transfer tool for YouTube Music debuted a month ago, and surprise, it's getting swamped. Google now warns users that transfers are "delayed" because of high demand. Transfers are still happening, but they're going to be slow enough that Google felt the need to warn everyone.
Google Play Music is on the way out but YouTube Music still isn't available for kids under 13
You might have to switch to another service if kids account support is important to you
A year and a half ago, we warned that you shouldn't migrate your family subscription to YouTube Music if you want to keep your Play Music child accounts intact. With the shutdown of Play Music inching closer, the situation has changed a little, but the core of the problem is still present: According to YouTube's terms, children under the age of 13 aren't allowed to use the service officially — only YouTube Kids is open to them. Thus, young minors won't be able to stream once Google shuts down Play Music.
Back in January, Sonos filed a lawsuit against Google, telling the story of a company that used its power to steal intellectual property and infringe on 100 separate patents. The claims even raise the topic of antitrust. The filing called for the courts to ban the sale of most Google-made products with any relationship to audio. Google is now firing back with its own countersuit aiming to shut down the initial attack.
How YouTube Music uploads differ from Play Music: Everything you need to know
As it turns out, YouTube Music still can't compare to Play Music
As the Play Music library migration tool rolls out more widely in the past week, more and more people are discovering the limitations and pitfalls of uploaded songs on YouTube Music. While some are obvious—like YouTube Music sequestering away uploaded songs in an entirely separate area—there are others you may only encounter with time. While the feature has been live for months now, many people are only encountering YouTube Music's uploaded library feature in the past few days, and what you find may not exactly thrill you. Here's everything you need to know about the drawbacks (and, occasionally, benefits) of YouTube Music's cloud music storage feature.
Play Music's ridiculous device authorization limit is still an issue with YouTube Music
Why keep the worst possible feature when you relaunch a product?
Do you remember how many smartphones you've owned? And do you remember the first phone you've ever used with a subscription service like Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Spotify, YouTube Premium, or Google Play Music? While the companies behind these services probably save that information to some server, Google is the only one among them that will rub that knowledge into your face. As long-time users probably know, Play Music comes with a hard 10-device limit that doesn't automatically kick off older devices, instead only allowing four manual deauthorizations every year. If you frequently switch devices (or merely factory reset them), you might have already ended up running into the limit at some point in the past, locking you out of the service you pay good money for.
Google will kill Play Music this year, launches YouTube Music migration tool
There is no firm date yet, and Google will provide "plenty of notice"
It took Google a long time to polish up YouTube Music, and there are still many die-hard Google Play Music users that aren't content with the company's new streaming product. But thanks to recent additions like file upload support and the Explore tab, Google deems YouTube Music to be almost ready to replace Play Music once and for all later this year. That's why Google has just started rolling out a migration tool allowing Play Music users to move over all of their content to the new platform, though they'll be able to access it on both services for the time being. There's also an additional workflow to move podcasts over to Google Podcasts.