A Solid Review Of iTunes Radio

As an avid user of the multiple radio knock off apps that are out there, I have tried plenty of them – or at least the important ones – i.e. Pandora, Spotify, and now, iTunes Radio. In my opinion, iTunes Radio now dominated the internet radio world and for so many reasons! Here we go…

First, let’s talk competitors.

Spotify is alright, if you want to pay monthly for any good use, but I can bet that their music library will not have even 40% of the albums or songs you want to listen to. Of course, sometimes it’s good to listen to songs on the random which this brand is great for, but sometimes you’re in a specific music mood and Spotify will not tailor to a majority of the specifics.

Pandora has been a favorite of mine for a long time. The stations are pretty good at determining what you want to listen to and what you don’t want to listen to – after you skip enough songs, but REMEMBER, you can only skip about five songs. Pandora is also a temperamental internet radio station because sometimes it doesn’t match up the song title with the song playing.

iHeartRadio. The only time I actually enjoy iHeartRadio is when they have their music festival, but for the most part, they focus on commercial music that is killed by normal FM radio every day.

FINALLY – let’s discuss iTunes Radio

It’s awesome. iTunes has been the go-to music downloaded haven for over a decade now, but the prices are what turn people off. To be honest, I only use iTunes to preview songs before I go and download them for way cheaper – or nothing at all. However, due to iTunes basically being a giant music store at the tip of your fingers, it’s still the go-to place for new albums and singles. Here’s a list of the amazing things iTunes Radio lets you do:

• Listen to new albums for a full week before they are released [Taken off 48 hours before the release date]
• It lets you build a list titled “Play More Like This…” and of course another titled “Never Play This…”
• You have a severely large quantity of music at your finger tips
• The commercials are more bearable than Pandora
• They have pre-structured playlists [i.e. iTunes Music Festival, iHeartRadioFestival, Guest Celebrity DJ etc.]

So, basically – iTunes Radio is worth a try regardless of what the critics say. I have yet to run into any serious problems and it seems to be following my list of songs that I don’t prefer to listen to – and all songs like it!