Amazon Music Unlimited is a service that has been present for some time on the servers of the e-commerce giant but in Italy the official launch came only at the end of September 2017: how it works and how does it fit into a very crowded offering (with competitors such as Apple Music and Spotify above all) in a fast-growing industry that, perhaps, will one day supplant archived music altogether?
We've updated the our article coinciding with the special offer of the spring offers 2019 that offer 3 months of free trial: the details are on this page.
Amazon Music Unlimited, the player web
Amazon could not fail to face such a business as a protagonist, because the user base is vast and above all because the catalog to its credit is already present and the implementation was only a step in more.
Yeah, the pool of music, with more than 50 million songs to listen to is a nice saying, because to listen to them all it would take about 250 years without sleep, but the point is that more than quantity you need the listening quality, the presence of the hits and the real possibility of eliminating our archive of 100 GB of music carefully selected in the last twenty years to switch to streaming in all respects.
Amazon Music for Mac
Amazon Music Unlimited review, the technical aspect
Subscribing to Amazon Music Unlimited is very easy, especially if you are a customer Amazon Prime, because in the annual subscription you save two months net, both in the single and family version ly (99 Euros per year instead of 119.88 for the individual subscription, 149 Euros instead of 179.88 for the family one) and this allows you to listen to the entire Amazon music library in a complete and unlimited way, streaming from any device (Mac, PC, iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, Android smartphone and tablet, web).
One of the aspects that you first notice is the fact that the Amazon App Music for iOS, Android and Mac (platforms where we tested it) is system independent, which is both an advantage and a disadvantage, depending on the preferences of those who use it.
The only creative license, if we want to call it that, is the use via the web, which appeared to us as complete and satisfying as the App.
The Mac App also allows a more flashy view of the songs while listening
App for smartphones and tablets
In the mobile apps it is possible to download the music we prefer to be able to listen to it even offline , an operation which, however, must be carried out manually and always within the App: this possibility does not seem possible from the Mac App (nor, but we expected this, via the web) but the App itself offers, in an exclusive way, an interesting integration with the iTunes library so you can play the songs stored locally, always from the same App.
As is in vogue for a modern cloud service, all the playlists created are synchronized for all devices and also the list of selected songs and categories , so much so that the impression we had is that the service tends to offer us songs to listen to more and more consistent with what we have heard up to that moment, although for the test for Cyberlayman we have deliberately ranged between many genres and authors, even very different ones.
service obviously also integrates with Amazon Music, which however remains to be purchased separately, where we can upload 250 musical songs those from our library (250,000 at a price of 24.99 Euros per year); Amazon will check if they already exist in the catalog or not, making them also available for streaming on all devices.
The interaction with the various platforms is very nice: on Mac, for example for example, playback is also controlled from the keyboard via the predefined keys (on macOS 10.13, with iTunes closed), which is quite natural also on iOS and Android, although an App for Apple TV is missing.
The technical notes end with the details of the certification: Amazon Music Unlimited allows you to register up to 10 devices in which to enable listening, not simultaneous, of streaming, or simultaneous up to five devices together but only on the Family contract; deactivating a device frees a seat after 30 days.
Amazon Music Unlimited, here on iPhone
The service within Alexa
We remind you that through the Alexa compatible devices you can recall all the Music Unlimited songs, the playlists and Albums simply with a voice request. We refer you to the device tests on macitynet.it to illustrate how it works.
There is an Echo subscription linked to a single Echo device at a convenient price (3.99 Euro per month) and other types of subscription that we will see at the bottom of the article.
Through Alexa voice control you can ask Alexa to play music. Anyone who has listened to music on an Amazon Echo device is already familiar with Alexa voice control.
Here are some examples: Alexa, play Vasco Rossi Alexa, play Alexa rock music, play Alexa aperitif playlist, play recent Alexa music, play Alexa famous music, play J-Ax Alexa's latest song, play l 'latest album by Thejournalists Alexa, play music from the 90s Alexa, play happy music Alexa, turn up the volume Alexa, put on some music Alexa, put song title from (music service – Amazon Music Unlimited – Spotify etc) Alexa , put song title by artist name from (music service) Alexa, put playlist title from Spotify (music service) Alexa, put genre name on (music service) Alexa, put (music service restarting from pause) Alexa, show me songs, playlists, genres, albums of (music service) Alexa, pause Alexa, resume Alexa , mute Alexa, previous Alexa, next Alexa, rewind by xx seconds Alexa, put the Sanremo 2019 playlist on Amazon Music Alexa, next song Alexa, open Radio Deejay Alexa, open Virgin Radio Alexa, open Radio Italia Alexa, put the last Last song on Amazon Music Alexa, play Peter Gabriel Alexa songs, play Jovanotti Alexa's latest album, play music to sleep Alexa, play music to run Alexa, play music to meditate Alexa, open Tibetan bells Alexa, what's the your favorite music? Alexa, open 'Relaxing Sounds' Alexa, open 'Relaxing Piano' Alexa, help me relax Alexa, make the night forest noise Alexa, make the rain noise Alexa, play some kids music Alexa, put the Best of 2018 playlist on Amazon Music Alexa, what song is this? (to ask Alexa what song you are listening to) Alexa, play Christmas music
You can manage Alexa playlists, add this song to my Alexa playlist, add this to my “Kitchen” playlist Alexa, create a new Alexa playlist, create a new playlist from this song
You can set an Alexa timer, set a 30 minute sleep timer (Alexa turns off the music after 30 minutes)
Amazon Music Unlimited review, the quantitative aspect
It is inevitable to think that, however, the success of a service like this must also pass through the quality and the presence of some contents.
From what we have been able to notice the hits are all there, including the not exactly recent ones, as well as the most successful titles of the various genres: looking here and there we read that Amazon Music has the exclusivity on many songs by Garth Brooks, a name that, however, here we do not has the same overseas appeal , where the market and tastes are very different.
Some very particular tracks are missing, such as Aurora by Hans Zimmer but on the other hand we found very particular tracks linked to the Italian market such as the soundtracks of Bud Spencer's film or Claudio Bisio's Rapput album or the major (remixed) successes of the Aeroplanitaliani, quite unusual types of tracks that denote the degree of refinement of the catalog. some goodies, such as some performances by Cyndi Lauper and Sarah McLachlan, while looking good is missing some Bootlegs from the 80s, which at the time we had purchased on CD but of which we do not know if there really is a track in digital.
If compared with iTunes, the Amazon catalog appears to be equally solid and well-stocked for general use, and where songs are missing, they are almost always very small productions and for which they are the authors themselves and for various reasons do not have had time or desire to enter the presence on Amazon, while for the big or medium names the two catalogs are completely identical.
In detail we have not found all the albums of Act Noir, some are missing album also by the Italian Centrozoon while Keziah Jones's Live EP album features only the six standard tracks, when there is a CD with two more tracks (the defect is identical on iTunes).
Playlists and radio
Well done the prepackaged playlists, drawn up by the internal staff of Amazon, which adequately follow the musical taste of our peninsula, also considering the Recommended section, which basically matches the songs we listen to with similar proposals based on the ratings of other users.
A special mention for the radios , which although sometimes a little 'redundant, in some cases they are very interesting, especially those dedicated to large m asters: often, while working, we dedicate ourselves to those by letting someone choose the pieces in our place, always remaining in a controlled choice scale.
For the rest, the same judgment applies to the other systems of streaming: the Amazon Music App is not iTunes, so you are led more to a choice of generalist and trendy music rather than a more intimate one as for example you tend to do when you use your own library, and this, over time, it is only good because there are fewer repetitions and a fresher enjoyment.
Obviously, the App allows you to create your own playlists of songs in complete freedom as well as to listen to entire sets of albums , even if with the possibility of exploiting prepackaged playlists or radios this need is less and less.
No cheating: streaming only goes to one device at a time at the same time, if we want to increase the number we have to switch to the Family plan
Quality A audio
From our personal listening with excellent headphones and from the opinions of many pro users, the streaming of Amazon Unlimited at the highest quality chosen in the settings is not very dissimilar from that Spotify and Apple Music: the average bitrate is around 320 kbps and if you really have to make a ranking, to be confirmed as mentioned only with level instruments with an external DAC and a headphone in the 200-400 Euro range, you can to say that Apple Music is in the first place by a whisker, followed by a whisker by Amazon Unlimited in turn by a whisker in front of Spotify.
What's missing
If we can speak of shortcomings, we must consider that of the lack of portability to other devices not contemplated such as smartwatch or bluetooth headphones with memory, where the streaming service does not arrive at a difference of Apple Music that can also be listened to on Apple Watch.
In the meantime, we invite readers to try the free service. for the first 90 days, evaluating its effectiveness which, given the type of content, is necessarily subjective.
The Amazon Music app is available as well as for iPhone, iPad and Mac (download here) for Fire, Android, Web and PC devices. To learn more about Amazon Music Unlimited, visit the dedicated web page.
Pro :
Cons :
Price : 3.99 Euro per month for those with a Amazon Echo device, 9.99 Euros per month (Individual), 14.99 Euros per month (Family), 99.00 or 149.00 Euros per year for Prime customers
Spring 2019 offer: three months free
With the spring 2019 offers, Amazon has made a special offer available for those who have never used the service within Prime:
To use the offer, start from this page . The regulation below.
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