Though Apple's music strategy is now more about its relatively new streaming service, Apple Music, its tried-and-true iTunes application is still best-in-class. In the latest iTunes update, the Apple Music section gets a new look to match that of the iOS version. In addition to all of the capabilities you've come to know and love in iTunes—the music player and store, movies, TV, iPhone syncing, books, iTunes U, podcasts, and Internet radio—it also includes the new Connect music-focused social network. iTunes is jam-packed with tools for media consumption, and it's unmatched by any competitor.
The Interface
Despite iTunes shifting several interface items around to different places on its window, the interface manages to remain familiar. It no longer has the button that switches between Store and Library mode, and content types are now accessed with permanent buttons rather than via dropdown. Browser-like back and forward arrows helpfully let you navigate between any visited pages.
Switching to the mini-player is easier than ever. A small icon showing a double box that appears when you hover the mouse over the album art thumbnail gets you the smaller, square CD Cover view; a squeeze icon reduces even that to a bar. A little oddly, the X button on the smaller sizes takes you back to the full window rather than closing the program.
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The User Icon button has been ditched along with the Wish List button on the main window. Your only entry points to app features are the standard menu, the left-rail content selector (music, movies, TV, and so on) and prominent top-center buttons for Library, For You, Browse, Radio, and Store.
Most of the changes help demystify previous iTunes interfaces. For example, you don't have to switch between Library and Store modes—you can buy new content from search or by hitting the big Store link at any time.
Speaking of search, not only does it now cover both your own library content and store items, but it also shows you trending searches so you can see what's popular. Album view still drops down a panel below the album art when you click on an album cover, but now these are all gray instead of colorized to match the album cover. From this view, you can click on the … button to add songs to a playlist, love or dislike it, or share it via email or link.
You have three choices when creating playlists—New Playlist, New Smart Playlist, or New Playlist Folder. When you do create a new list, it's added to the left panel, where you can drag items onto it from any other view.
Apple Music Subscription Service
Apple Music is a streaming music service to combat the likes of Slacker Radio, Spotify ($0.00 at Apple.com) , and Microsoft's Groove Music, all of which let you pay a monthly fee to play any song in the catalog on demand. Like most other services, Apple Music costs $9.99 per month, after a generous 90-day free trial period. A six-listener Family membership runs $14.99 per month, and qualified students pay only $4.99 per month. Of course, Apple Music targets iPhone, iPad, and Mac users, but there's also an Apple Music Android app, and, as mentioned, Apple Music lives inside the iTunes applications for Windows PC users. But there's no Web interface for the service, unfortunately.
The recent redesign makes using the service clearer and easier to get to. There's no Apple Music choice in the interface, per se, but the For You, Browse, and Radio choices take you to Apple Music's features. Though the service offers selections from a massive library, it doesn't include everything you can buy on iTunes; titles such as Prince's Purple Rain are missing. But I was able to stream the entire Beatles catalog. The curated and Pandora-like custom radio stations deliver, though the Beats1 station is based on the presumption that its DJ knows what everyone should like, which is probably not the case for a lot of listeners.
Apple Music also adds a music-focused social network called Connect (found under the For You choice), from which you can follow your favorite performers. (Apparently Apple didn't learn from its Ping fiasco.) On Connect, artists can share thoughts and material that fans can comment on and interact with in a Pinterest-like card view. Pharrell used his page to debut his new single, "Freedom." Other social features include the ability to share playlists, albums, and Apple Music's large library of ad-free HD music videos through Facebook and Twitter. Your Connect profile automatically follows artists whose songs you've purchased, which is useful. For more on Apple Music ($10.99 Per Month at Apple Music) read our full review.
Finally, I should note, that, unlike Spotify and Pandora, there's no free listening with Apple Music, with one exception: anyone can listen to the Beats 1 Internet radio station, for what it's worth. I'd prefer an ad-supported option. That would keep more people in the Apple Music fold rather than having them jump to Pandora or Slacker Radio. ($0.00 at Apple.com) I also wish that albums and tracks on the iTunes Store knew about your Apple Music subscription—they don't, so might pay for a track that you might have listened to free. Granted, you might legitimately want to own a track that's also on Apple Music, but some warning or confirmation would be nice. Groove Music and the Windows Store handle this better: If you land on a song covered by your subscription, the Store forwards you to it Groove to play it for you without another purchase.
iCloud Family Sharing
If you have an Apple iOS product, you can set up Family Sharing, which lets a head of household set up an account that purchases media for family members' accounts and lets them enjoy the main account's purchases. Sensibly, child accounts' purchases have to be approved before they're made. Once everything is set up, all family members' purchased media appears in the Family Purchases page. I do wish the desktop version of iTunes let you set this up rather than only viewing purchases. For more on the service, read How to Set Up Family Sharing in iOS.
Connecting iOS Devices
Plugging in an iPhone ($769.99 at Verizon) , iPad, or iPod touch reveals a button next to the media buttons at top left, and drops a helpful tooltip showing the device name and type. Once you click it, a left panel shows two lists of all the content types, one for settings (including syncing options) and one for the actual content. You can check for iOS updates; restore from backups; configure all your media, apps, photos, and other files; and see your battery charge. The latest design makes adding music from the PC to the iOS device much simpler. You just drag it from the center panel onto the device's icon. And more convenient Wi-Fi syncing of iOS devices has been available for years, and still is.
iTunes Store
The Store link is always showing now unless you're browsing a device. Gone is the 3D cover flow view, with the flattened design showing featured content at top. It closely matches the experience you get on iPads ($313.99 at Best Buy) and iPhones. One section I like is "New from Your Artists," which points to new releases from groups you've previously purchased. I also note that, on the PC, you can hold control and spin the mouse wheel if the text and images are too small—something not possible in the Mac version.
iCloud
iTunes has integrated with iCloud for a while, via iTunes in the Cloud and iTunes Match. Content you purchase on a mobile iOS device is instantly available on your Mac or PC—as long as the machine is authorized. The whole authorization process gives me pains, since I need to sign into a large number of test PCs and Macs at home and work; I use up my five authorizations quickly. You can only deauthorize all devices or the current one, neither of which helps. It's probably not such a big deal for the average user, however.
Once the computer is successfully authorized, each album you've purchased on any of your devices shows up in an album cover thumbnail on your Albums page, and each of these has a download button in the form of that now-ubiquitous cloud icon. It makes the purchased content available for offline playing. Just as Netflix does, iCloud lets you pause a show on one computer or device and pick up where you left off on another. Pretty slick.
iTunes Podcast Features
After a recent podcast-focused update, iTunes really simplifies podcast consumption. The main view simply shows a left panel with all your subscriptions and choices to view unplayed and saved episodes. My Stations offers a way to organize your podcasts into similarly themed material. You can decide which podcasts to include in a station, set the order of play, choose how many recent episodes to include, and choose whether to include video or just audio. It's a convenient, if not momentous feature.
The auto-delete feature is actually pretty useful. Why would you want the media file taking up space on your hard drive after you've already played it? You can usually re-download it if you really want to listen again, unless the particular podcast charges for archival episodes. Another music player I've been using, MusicBee, has most of these features, in addition to a helpful podcast directory, but the old standby Windows Media Player and the geek favorite VLC have nowhere near this kind of control over podcast consumption.
iTunes Extras
iTunes Extras amounts to things like behind-the-scenes videos, short films, high-resolution image galleries, and director commentary. Apple TV makes the same bonus features available through that set-top appliance. Extras apply to new films you buy through iTunes, as well as ones you already own. In other words, if you already bought a movie, and Extras become available for it. They're also available on iOS devices.
In the Store view, the movies that include Extras are marked as such, with some big titles, such as The Legend of Tarzan, X-Men: Apocalypse, and Captain America: Civil War among them. The Extras for Grand Budapest Hotel include two behind-the-scenes featurettes and a gallery of still photos, while other titles include deleted scenes, commentaries, and buttons to skip ahead or track back to the scenes you want to watch. These are nice perks, if not indispensable ones.
iTunes for the Apple Ecosystem
This one-stop media purchaser and player still includes a wealth of features we haven't discussed that could fill books: iTunes U, Home Sharing, a book store, and TV show rentals and purchases. Apple's iTunes is nearly the ideal media-playing and -purchasing software. It's hard to beat as a digital music, movie, and podcast player. The improvements in the redesigned iTunes address interface clutter and performance issues, and Family Sharing is a great convenience for households. Finally, we get an all-you-can-eat music subscription service, such as those offered by Groove Music, Spotify, and Tidal. Apple iTunes' wealth of whiz-bang features, massive content library, slick design, and fast performance all earn it our Editors' Choice for media-playing software.
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