Canadian music fans rejoice – starting today, Google Play Music is now available to our northern neighbors, according to a post over at the official Google Canada blog. As in the U.S., Google is offering its cloud-based personal music storage locker for free to Canadians, too. While this alone makes Google Play Music a force to be reckoned with, users who upgrade to the monthly subscription fee will unlock its full potential.
Included in both the free and paid versions of Google Play Music is the aforementioned music storage locker, which allows for storage of roughly 20,000 stream-ready songs. However, those who pay up will be able to listen to and scan through Google’s All Access catalog, with millions of songs set alongside their personal libraries in a seamless interface, along with gaining access to other amenities.
Shelling out the extra dough for an All Access account will net you the following features and capabilities:
- Unlimited ad-free listening to millions of songs
- Create personalized radio from any song or artist
- Listen to radio with unlimited skips, and always see what’s coming next (Google added offline radio listening for All Access members in February)
- Get smart recommendations based on your tastes
Every user – All Access and otherwise – can access their tunes with any Android or iOS device – or via browser – and “pin” specific albums, artists, songs, and playlists for offline listening.
As part of a promotional push, Google is currently offering a special launch price of $8 per month for its All Access subscription plan for all users in the U.S. and Canada for those who sign up by the June 30 cutoff. The price jumps up to a monthly $10 for those who sign up any later, which is on par with competing services like Spotify and Beats Music. Both price offerings also come with an initial 30 days of free service.
Google Play Music has begun to cement itself as one of the standard music streaming services that many hardware and software makers alike are baking into their products – Sonos’s multi-room speaker systems being one of the latest to do so. Check back here for the latest news as Google presses forward against Spotify, Pandora, Beats Music and others in the music-streaming battle.
