Amazon Music is Amazon’s own music streaming platform, and a competitor to services like Spotify, Deezer and Apple Music.
The platform houses a catalog of over 70 million music tracks, in addition to podcast content.
Amazon Music confirmed in January 2020 that it had over 55 million customers worldwide across its different tiers.
Pricing and tiers
Amazon Music offers a range of pricing options for its product.
The lowest pricing tier starts at $3.99 per month in the US, only allowing consumers to subscribe to ad-free streaming for one Amazon Echo device.
The standard pricing tier, Amazon Music Unlimited, costs $9.99 per month or $7.99 per month for an individual with an active Amazon Prime membership.
In September 2019, Amazon Music launched its Amazon Music HD tier, offering “CD quality” sonics for listeners. Amazon Music HD launched at a $14.99 per month price point, or at $12.99 per month for existing Prime members.
Singer/songwriter Neil Young, a long-time advocate for better quality streaming audio, said of Amazon Music HD: “Earth will be changed forever when Amazon introduces high quality streaming to the masses.
“This will be the biggest thing to happen in music since the introduction of digital audio 40 years ago.”
A free Amazon Music tier, Prime Music, is available for Amazon Prime members, offering a limited catalog of around two million songs.
Other news and milestones
In September 2020, Amazon Music announced an official intertwining of its service with another Amazon company, live-streaming platform Twitch.
A month later, Amazon Music announced that thousands of “better than CD quality” recordings – in Ultra HD format – would be coming to Amazon Music HD thanks to licensing agreements with Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group.
In late December 2020, Amazon Music announced it has agreed a deal to acquire podcast production company Wondery in a deal believed to be worth over $300m.Music Business Worldwide