Apple Music Classical appears to be getting an Android app ahead of other Apple products. Apple is cementing its mobile-first strategy with this move.
Apple acquired Primephonic in 2021 to use the platform’s rich metadata searching to build out its own Classical Music offering. Apple Music Classical launched earlier this year as an iOS-only exclusive. Now Android classical music fans can get in on the action as long as they have an Apple Music subscription.
In the past, Apple made sure it brought new offerings to its suite of products first. By bringing Apple Music Classical to a competing OS first, Apple is showcasing that mobile growth matters more than ease of access for those already in the ecosystem.
Apple Music Classical is not yet available on iPad or Mac, nor is it viewable with CarPlay. The app is now available to download in the Google Play Store and works just like it does for iOS users—anyone with an Apple Music subscription can download the app and listen to classical music.
Primephonic was platform agnostic when Apple acquired the service, so it’s likely the tech guts for this rollout was easy to accomplish. Now that the app is available for Android, the team behind the Apple Music Classical app can focus on building out other experiences. One of the primary complaints about the current experience is that there is no iPad or Mac app available. The app can be downloaded onto an iPad, but there’s no optimized layout, which makes it unwieldy.
Other features classical music fans have been asking for in the app include the ability to download music to their device, queue music to listen to entire works and add some type of autoplay feature for an endless stream of classical music while working, exercising, or entertaining. With the Android app finally out, maybe these wishlist requests will see some development now.