Google Play Music has finally been launched in India. This is the music streaming service from Google that officially came to India more than two years ago.
However, Google did not have music licencing for streaming, so users could only buy songs/albums from Google Play Music. Now, Google has got its business in order and has finally made their extensive library of songs online in India.
Pricing
Google Play Music costs Rs 89 a month if you sign up within the next 45 days. This is an introductory offer only. After the 45 days offer period, the service will cost Rs 99 per month.
This is more or less in the same price bracket as the other services, all of which cost somewhere between 70-125 rupees a month. Essentially, between $ 1 and $ 2.
The competition
Google Play Music goes online nearly a year after Apple Music. And while Apple may be Google’s bigger archrivals in the global market, the story in India is a bit different.
The Indian music streaming industry is already flooding with various players. Saavn, Wynk, and Gaana are probably the biggest players here. However, they too are facing stiff competition from recent entrants such as Vodafone Play, Airtel Music, and Jio Music.
The distinct advantage they have over Google Play Music and Apple Music is that these Indian grown streaming services have a huge regional collection. That’s a huge plus considering that the Indian audience is hugely stratified into regional languages.
However, the core consumer of theses service — the urban young — are also largely attracted to Western music, something that Apple and Google can both claim a mastery over.
Features
Google says it has the largest library of songs: upwards of 35 million. Which is a huge number and it certainly is more than the others.
Google also claims that it has a bigger regional language collection that the rest of the service providers. On the first look, that does seem to be the case. However, we will be able to say for sure only after using the service for a month or so. Google is really keen on harnessing the regional potential of the music industry, that’s why it has introduced a new feature based on its Location Services.
If you’ve enabled Google’s Location Services on your phone, then Google Play Music will automatically curate your top charts based on the location you are in. For example, if you travel to Chandigarh, Punjabi songs will be featured on top, and if you travel to Hyderabad, Telugu songs will pop up to the top.
Google also trumps the others in offering the users upto 50,000 songs worth of upload space. The unique thing about this storage is that it is not measured in MBs or GBs, instead, it’s the number of songs. 50,000 of them, to be exact. There’s no question that that’s more than enough storage!
The real question, however, is:
Can it beat Apple Music?
The biggest leg up that Google Play Music has over Apple Music is that it comes pre-installed on all the Android phones. In India, that would mean that more than 90% of all smartphones!
More importantly, it is the default music player app in stock Android. Meaning that most users are already using the app to play music stored on their phones. So Google has reach, and familiarity already on its side. Add to that the massive library it boasts of, and I think we have a winning combination here.
But, having said that, it’s an open market and a very unpredictable one at that. So we’ll know for sure only after a couple of months.