The HomePod is Apple’s smart speaker, but it’s nowhere near as popular as the Amazon Echo. If you have signed up for Apple Music and had been thinking you would need a HomePod in order to play your favourite music, you are wrong. You can play your Apple Music tunes on your Amazon Echo.
If you have an Amazon Echo you can ask Alexa to play tracks from Apple Music, find out how below.
The feature has been available on Amazon speakers in the US for a few months and has now arrived on Amazon speakers in the UK. The change happened at around the time Apple dropped the price of the HomePod speaker (you can now get a HomePod for £279 in the UK, or $299 in the US – buy one from Apple here).
Sorry to our readers who aren’t based in the US or the UK, you might not have this service yet – but it is likely to be coming to you soon. Find out more about when you can expect it below…
Find out how Amazon’s Echo compares to HomePod here.
How to play Apple Music on Amazon Echo
- To start, open the Amazon Alexa app on your iPhone.
- Tap the three lines on the top left to open the menu.
- Tap on Skills & Games.
- The Apple Music skill should show, if it doesn’t search for Apple Music. Tap on the Apple Music Skill.
- Choose Enable To Use.
- Sign In with your Apple ID.
- Confirm the Access request and wait for Alexa and Apple Music to link.
Sign up for Apple Music here: Apple Music. It costs £9.99/$9.99 a month, or £14.99/$14.99 a month for a family.
How to get Alexa to play Apple Music
To get Alexa to play a track from Apple Music on your Echo you will need to say:
“Alexa play [name of song/playlist] on Apple Music”.
You can set Apple Music to be the default service on your Alexa, so that you don’t have to specify Apple Music each time.
- If you want Apple Music to be the default service on the Amazon Echo, open the menu and then go to Settings.
- Tap on Music to open the Music Setting in the Alexa App.
- Now you have added the Apple Music skill (as above) you’ll see Apple Music as an option here.
- Tap on Default Service and change it to Apple Music.
When will Apple Music for Alexa be available where I live?
Apple Music arrived on the Echo in December 2018, but only in the US. Then it arrived in the UK on 4 April 2019.
We anticipate that there won’t be a long wait until Apple Music arrives on Amazon Echos at other locations. It’s might be that the reason for the delay is because music rights are different in different countries.
Author: Karen Haslam, Editor
Macworld editor since 2008, Karen has worked on both sides of the Apple divide, clocking up a number of years at Apple's PR agency prior to joining Macworld almost two decades ago.
Karen's career highlights include interviewing Apple's Steve Wozniak and discussing Steve Jobs’ legacy on the BBC. Her focus is Mac, but she lives and breathes Apple.