It has been five years since Apple bought Shazam, and a slow march of new features has made it better for everyone. It still supports other services like Spotify and Deezer (not just Apple Music) and has a good Android app, for example. But it’s the ways in which it has been improved as a part of the Apple ecosystem that impresses us most.
Apple has added Shazam to Siri, using the service’s back-end technology when you ask Siri, “What’s this song?” On iPhones with Dynamic Island, you even get a nifty listening and results animation.
The latest Shazam app update adds a particularly useful feature: Lock screen widgets. There are two, large and small, and tapping it will jump you immediately to the Shazam app which will be listening to identify whatever song is playing where you are. The small widget is just the Shazam logo, while the larger widget shows the name of the last Shazam song ID.
Song identification is all about speed and ease of use: By the time you go through a lot of steps, the moment has passed and the song may no longer be playing. Having the ability to start identifying a song without even unlocking your iPhone or pulling open Control Center, without even asking Siri (which may not be viable in some environments), is a big quality-of-life improvement.
The new Shazam version with Lock Screen widgets, version 15.38, is available in the App Store now. If you need help customizing your lock screen to add widgets, read our guide.
Author: Jason Cross, Senior Editor
I have written about technology for my entire professional life - over 25 years. I enjoy learning about how complicated technology works and explaining it in a way anyone can understand.