Music Family Plans Throwdown
 

OK, I've been considering signing up for a music family plan so everyone in our family can listen to what they want. I see four main options.

Google Play Music Unlimited
Amazon Music Unlimited
Apple Music
Spotify

From what I have seen so far, whichever service you use, you are tied to their app so using a third party app is not an option. (this sucks for me because I absolutely love PowerAmp. Also, none of their apps feature an equalizer to get a richer sound.

Anyway, of the four services which offers the most bang for the buck as well as the least restrictions?

If possible, lets avoid any service flame wars. I'm just looking for information to make a good choice.

Oh, we are all on android. I have heard that the itunes app for android is still buggy so there is that.

I've got Amazon, along with the echo, and dots. I like it so far. But still getting accustom to it.

I'm going Amazon, but I've only really compared it to Spotify. If you have prime it's a few bucks cheaper and it has a slightly better (from what I can tell) selection. Plus I never cared for the social aspects of Spotify.

FWIW I also keep a Pandora subscription because I think their stations are much better than either Spotify or Amazon's counterparts.

The one thing about the family membership is that all four of them are 14.99

Well this went nowhere fast. I guess these services are not as popular as I thought.

Anyone else read this and picture the Osmonds in a fistfight?

I went with Google Play because you also get add free YouTube.

No complaints with it

What exactly do you get with youtube red anyway? I noticed some original series but none of them really looked interesting.

When I listen to music on the couch, I like to watch videos from live recordings. Anything from recent festivals (mostly EDM) to classic concerts from my youth.

Or sometimes I will get going on a movie kick. For instance the other night I watched every song from the Pink Floyd movie The Wall. The entire film wasn't there but there were film clips that had each song in its entirety. I'll do the same thing with musicals that I've seen and liked.

If you watch a long clip, the adds aren't a big deal. But if you get to quickly jumping around it gets annoying.

If you don't watch YouTube then this aspect of Google Play won't matter.

Get the TuneIn app for your Android device. Steal what you want off of YouTube. Done.

Pandora is coming out with their "unlimited, on demand plan" soon (they bought the old Rdio). I'm looking forward to seeing how it measures up to the rest because you're right...their stations are much better.

For me it seem the benefit is ad free youtube which is actually pretty nice.

I use google music only because that is what I started with but it works well with my android tv devices. Sounds like the main streaming services are all pretty much the same. I'm surprised when my friends don't subscribe to one are oblivious to the concept that basically all of music is included.

The biggest difference that you NEED to know? There's no Tool on Spotify. Decision made.

I've really been liking the Amazon unlimited. I think we pay 3.99 on top of our yearly Amazon prime subscription. Has pretty much all the obscure music I listen to on it. Make my own playlists and when I get ready to go to bed and bang.... just say "Alexa, turn off the bedroom light, and shuffle sex music playlist" and let the fireworks begin!!

Pandora Premium begins rolling out this week. Really looking forward to giving it a shot.

http://www.theverge.com/2017/3/13/14...view-interview