Apple Music Catching Up With Spotify

Apple’s introduction of iOS 10 at WWDC unveiled a bold new version of its streaming app. The company is steadily gaining ground on their main rival, Spotify, which has a userbase twice as large as Apple’s 15 million. Early versions were plagued by many glitches due to the ambitious nature of the app, leading the developers to do a complete revamp.

Born out of Apple’s acquisition of Beats, the music streaming app has gotten praise and criticism for its many features which don’t work quite as smoothly as the rival. Integrating the app into the iTunes ecosystem has been difficult, and Apple greatly pulled back on Connect, its musical social network. There is a new emphasis on lyrics, in addition to personally curated playlists called For You, which appears to be directly borrowed from Spotify’s Discover Weekly section.

Graphically, the interface will be more streamlined with a black-and-white color scheme to emphasis album art colors. Beats radio will continue to provide original programming to listeners in more than 100 countries, though it will soon be facing competition from Amazon, rumored to be releasing its own streaming service this year.