Uber now lets you stream Pandora as the soundtrack for your ride

By Keith Nelson Jr. September 8, 2016

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In a car, the one who controls the music really controls the ride, and Uber just gave riders a bit more control over their next cruise. Today, Uber now allows riders to stream Pandora through the Uber car’s speakers directly from the Uber app.

Anyone with a Pandora account can enjoy their favorite music on their next Uber ride by connecting a Pandora account to their Uber account and matching with a music-connected driver. Once matched, a music bar will appear at the bottom of the rider’s screen allowing them to scroll through and select a station or playlist to play.

Users can also control the music playback in the Uber app, eliminating the need to toggle through apps to soundtrack your ride in the sunset. The music will play once the ride starts, and if your driver is playing Pandora when you match you can preview what music they are playing, turning every music connected Uber driver into a music curator on wheels.

With this move, Pandora joins Spotify in Uber’s rider music program after the ridesharing company added integration for Spotify Premium to its app back in 2014. The new music integration for riders also comes three months after Uber offered the same Pandora integration to Uber drivers, and the drivers responded quite passionately.

Since launching in June, drivers have streamed more than 60 million songs, representing over than four million hours of music. Uber made that heavy music consumption easier by allowing drivers to sign up for a free Pandora account and still enjoy ad-free music listening until December 28.

The new Pandora integrations with Uber in the last few months come as the internet radio giant begins to expand into more on-demand streaming. Pandora recently revamped its seven-year-old Pandora One subscription service by adding ad-free listening to the $5-a-month package. Pandora may be trying to make itself more attractive to potential buyers after the company started 2016 reportedly by talking about selling itself following a valuation drop from $7.5 billion in 2014 to $2 billion this year.

What are your favorite Pandora stations to play while on a cruise?

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Keith Nelson Jr.

Former Digital Trends Contributor

Keith Nelson Jr is a music/tech journalist making big pictures by connecting dots. Born and raised in Brooklyn, NY he…

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