Amazon Music Unlimited Live Radio Stations

Apple Music and Spotify receive lots of attention, but the streaming music services world is much larger than those industry juggernauts. Amazon Music Unlimited doesn't have all the bells and whistles of some competing services—it lacks extras like live radio and video content—but it offers more than 75 million songs, HD Audio, and a deep podcast well at a reasonable price. Our Editors' Choice options—LiveXLive, SiriusXM Internet Radio, Spotify, and Tidal—offer a few more perks, but Amazon Music Unlimited is great all-rounder for streaming audio.

How Much Does Amazon Music Unlimited Cost?

When it debuted, Amazon Music Unlimited lacked a free tier, much like Apple Music and Tidal. Not anymore. You can now listen to select ad-supported playlists and thousands of stations (for example, All Hits, Fuego Latino, and Holiday Favorites) via the web, Amazon Music mobile apps, Echo smart speakers, and FireTV devices. Spotify's free tier, on the other hand, lets you explore the service's full 60 million-song catalog. That said, some albums only appear on Spotify Free after a two-week delay.

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Of course, Music Unlimited also offers the industry-standard $9.99 per month premium plan for its ad-free Individual tier. Note, however, that Amazon Prime subscribers receive a discount that drops the fee to $7.99 per month (or $79 per year)—on top of their $129 per year Prime fees. No, Music Unlimitedisn't included with a Prime membership. Amazon Prime Music is. More on that later.

In addition, Amazon has a $14.99 per month (or $149 per year) Family Plan that covers six people. This offering rivals Apple Music, Deezer, Spotify, and Tidal's similar packages. A massive 90-day free trial—which cut down to 30 days for the Family Plan—is available for people who want to try before they subscribe. Amazon Music Unlimited's trial period outclasses rival trial periods, except for the one offered by SiriusXM Internet Radio. That service also boasts a 90-day free period.

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Amazon Echo, Echo Dot, Echo Look, Echo Show, Amazon Fire TV, and Amazon Tap owners receive a discount, too: they pay just $3.99 per month, which is the price of LiveXLive's ad-free Plus plan. That's impressive. If you want to stream to multiple smart speakers, however, you need to upgrade to an Individual or Family plan. Amazon Music Unlimited's voice-controlled device plans come with one big limitation: You cannot use them to stream music via apps or a web browser; youmust use one of the aforementioned devices.

Students who are a part of Prime Student ($6.49 per month, $59 per year) receive a discount that drops the Music Unlimited fee to just $0.99 per month.

Amazon Music Unlimited does not let you record audio. If you want that feature, your only option is SiriusXM Internet Radio, the Editors' Choice for streaming audio services focused on live audio.

Amazon Music Unlimited vs. Amazon Prime Music

Curious about the differences between Amazon Music Unlimited and Amazon Prime Music? We'll break it down. Amazon Music Unlimited is a standalone streaming music service that offers more than 75 million music tracks. Amazon Prime Music, on the other hand, is bundled in your Prime subscription and offers 2 million songs. Both are ad-free listening experiences and are available on numerous devices.

If you don't care too much about music, and just want to dabble here and there, Prime Music is a decent option. That said, you'll notice that some tracks and albums encourage you to sign up for Amazon Music Unlimited to hear them. For example, there was a time when you could not stream Taylor Swift'sReputation with Prime Music.

Signing up for Amazon Music Unlimited causes the service to replace Amazon Prime Music as your Amazon jukebox, so you needn't worry about launching the wrong streaming service.

Amazon Music Unlimited's scrolling lyrics

DJ Alexa

The increased library size makes Music Unlimited infinitely more interesting to use with Amazon devices. In the past, we'd often grow frustrated with Echo's inability to stream songs in their entirety due to licensing issues. Now, we can command an Echo, using the Alexa voice-control technology, to fire up the Red Hot Chili Peppers' "Suck My Kiss," and it does so without issue.

Amazon's smart gear also delivers behind-the-scenes commentary, dubbed Side-by-Sides. For example, you can ask Alexa to "play Side-by-Side with OneRepublic," and Ryan Tedder comments on songs from the band's newest album. The Killers, U2, Norah Jones, and Kongos also provide Side-by-Side content. It's reminiscent of LiveXLive's DNA stations, but without the deep historical context that connects past and present musicians.

In addition, you can use an Amazon device to search for songs by lyrics, fire up playlists, and search for songs to match your mood. It's cool to command Alexa to play up-tempo happy music and have the Echo blast the "Pop To Make You Feel Better" playlist.

Music Library and Audio Quality

Music Unlimited boasts more than 75 million songs and dozens of stations in its catalog, plus the expected Classical, Decades, Rock, and Hip-Hop stations. In a nice touch, any Amazon Prime Music playlists that you've created in the past carry over to Music Unlimited. You can, of course, create new ones, too.

Several parts of Music Unlimited's interface are designed to help you discover or buy music. Almost everywhere in the layout, you'll find recommended albums and playlists based on your listening habits. Thankfully, these suggestions don't feel forced upon you. In fact, we find them helpful.

The left navigation menu contains sections for Purchased and Imported music. The former has Amazon Music-purchased tracks that you can stream or download. The latter houses the files that you uploaded to Amazon's servers using the Amazon Music desktop app's now-defunct music uploading feature. Spotify, it should be noted, lets you upload music from your desktop.

We were pleased to see "Immigrant Song," "Whole Lotta Love," "Black Dog," and other Led Zeppelin classics appear on-screen after keying the band's name into Music Unlimited's large search box. They're the real tracks, too, not tribute works by bands no one cares about (though those also show up in the search results). The tracks sound good, as they stream up to a clear, 320Kbps bitrate in standard quality. This matches Tidal's Premium (320Kbps) service tier for the same $9.99 per month.

Music Unlimited has one of the best lyric features we've seen in the streaming music space. Instead of offering a static page like Deezer, Music Unlimited has karaoke-like scrolling text that moves in time with the performance. It's really cool, and we'd like other services to adopt similar lyrics integration.

The New Amazon Music Unlimited HD

If you want even higher-quality music streams, check out Amazon Music HD. It was originally a plan that cost an additional $5 per month, but following Apple's announcement of support for Spatial Audio with Dolby Atmos, that extra cost was removed. Now, all Amazon Music Unlimited subscribers can enjoy more than 75 million songs in HD quality (up to 850Kbps, 16-bit at 44.1kHz) and more than 7 million songs in Ultra HD quality (up to an absurd 3,730Kbps, 24-bit at 192kHz). This measures up pretty well to Tidal's HiFi (non-compressed, 1,411Kbps FLAC) plan, which is a whopping $19.99, but also occasionally sports Master tracks (up to 9,216Kbps). You're getting similar quality for a solid $9.99; that's half of Tidal's price. Even better, if you're an Amazon Prime member, you only pay $7.99 per month. It's a fine deal.

For HD audio, you need a device and internet connection that supports it. Amazon recommends an 1.5Mbps or higher connection, and headphones or speakers that support a dynamic range (20kHz+ for HD audio, 40kHz+ for Ultra HD audio). You'll also need more than a standard Amazon Echo; the company recommends the $199.99 Amazon Echo Studio, as well as hardware from Bose, Denon, Onkyo, and Polk.

You can only listen to Amazon Music HD via the Android, iOS, macOS, and Windows apps; you cannot stream the high-quality music via a web browser. On the upside, the apps have quality indicators to show when you're listening to an HD or Ultra HD track. You can read about the Ultra HD hardware requirements and general compatibility at Amazon's Music HD page.

The Amazon Music HD tracks sound quite good, though the improvements are mostly subtle. We found several Music HD playlists, including ones for David Bowie, Ariana Grande, Billie Holiday, and Queen, as well as many individual albums and songs. There's even a decent amount of K-Pop available on Amazon Music Unlimited; we jammed to a HD version of NCT Dream's "Hot Sauce," and an UltraHD version of CIX's "All For You."

We particularly enjoyed Queen's "Don't Stop Me Now," as John Deacon's bass lines sounded a hair deeper in the hi-res audio format. Cymbal crashes seemed to linger a bit longer, too. Note that we listened using a pair of mid-tier Audio-Technica headphones connected to a PC, a computer with a speedy landline connection. When we compared the sound using a pair of low-end earbuds plugged into our test phone, we couldn't detect a quality difference as the songs streamed over a Wi-Fi signal.

Amazon follows others with a podcast focus

Poppin' Podcasts

As mentioned earlier, don't expect much non-music content from Amazon Music Unlimited. There are a handful of comedy specials (in audio form), but no video or music editorial. That said, Amazon Music Unlimited pulls a page from Spotify's playback by offering a robust podcast catalog.

Amazon Music Unlimited subscribers who love Code Switch, Dolly Parton's America, or WTF With Marc Maron no longer need to venture elsewhere for those shows. Even better, Amazon Music Unlimited features exclusive, original podcasts hosted by notable celebrities, such as DJ Khaled, Becky G, Will Smith, and Dan Patrick. It's Amazon Music Unlimited's continuing move to stay in parity with the competition, especially in the highly competitive entertainment category.

Amazon Music Unlimited Mobile Apps

Amazon Music Unlimited has both an Android app and an iOS app. We tested the Android version on our smartphone and discovered that it closely duplicated the Music Unlimited desktop experience. The app contains copious playlists, useful recommendations, and a music store for making purchases. It contains lyrics, too.

In addition, you can use Amazon's Alexa tech to search for songs by lyrics or to play tracks and playlists. For example, when we asked Alexa for dinner music, it supplied a laid back, easy listening playlist.

Magical Sound Shower

Amazon Music Unlimited is a worthwhile streaming music and podcast service, and that recommendation rides almost entirely on the back of the service's Music HD catalog and Alexa, Echo, and Fire TV features. Plus, removing the Music HD fee only increases the value proposition. The music service lacks some of the content found in LiveXLive, SiriusXM Internet Radio, Spotify, and Tidal—PCMag's Editors' Choices for streaming music services, but Amazon Music Unlimited's high-quality features appeal to you, you won't be left disappointed.

For more, check out the Best Free Streaming Music Services and the Best Hi-Res Streaming Music Services.