Ireland now beta testing YouTube’s new music subscription service

12 Nov 2014

After months and months of speculation and details being leaked, YouTube has finally launched its music subscription service, YouTube Music Key, but initially only on an invite-only basis.

Last August, the first major details of what were entailed in the subscription service were leaked, and seemingly all details remain almost exactly the same.

For existing YouTube users and those not willing to fork out for a subscription fee of €9.99 per month, a new music tab will appear along with existing tabs that will offer recommendations based on what the user has listened to recently and what’s trending.

Also, YouTube Music Key will be integrated with Google Play so when a song or album is selected from Google Play, it will come up on YouTube and vice versa.

This will include advert interruptions that users of YouTube’s major competitors, Spotify, will already be aware of.

Ireland chosen as one of its early beta testers

For those looking to pay for the premium version of course, these adverts won’t apply and will also have the added advantage of being able to listen to music while locking the screen, something that has not been available on traditional YouTube.

Again similar to Spotify, users can save songs and playlists for offline use when they don’t have access to the internet, or don’t want to pay data rates.

Irish YouTube users will be some of the first to get a glimpse of YouTube Music Key as us, along with the US, Spain, Italy, Finland, Portugal and the UK, have been selected as beta testers.

 While currently on an invite-only basis, those given an ‘in’ will have the added benefit of being offered six months free with a reduced subscription rate of €7.99 once that has expired.

Colm Gorey was a senior journalist with Silicon Republic

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