Hey folks,
I made the switch to Android from iOS and I am looking for an equivalent to the iTunes store for buying music! Is there a good option or am I sort of shoe horned into subscribing to a streaming service?
Edit: Thanks for all the replies everyone!
There’s Bandcamp.
That’s what I mostly use.
Qobuz is good but lately they want you to install their software to just download albums you buy, or else you have to download one track at a time. Really petty and annoying
Oh no. If that’s true, I will not buy from there again.
I like 7digital. Haven’t used the other ones.
I’m an Android guy, always have been, always will. But I use Apple music; best quality music and you can download the tracks.
Any store that gives you access to the actual downloads is the way to go.
iTunes is suprisngly good about this - on a PC. Wherever the library folder is, you can just copy the files to your phone’s music folder (You might have to convert them from m4a to mp3 first). (You can also export ituens playlists to transfer them)
bandcamp, and amazon are good alts to itunes. (Not prime music, search for a song or album and buy the mp3 version just as if your buying anything else).
most itunes songs are drm free so unless you need to buy on your phone i just buy on desktop and save the songs to google drive
FYI: there are easy to use music converters online. For YouTube, SoundCloud, etc.
Does iTunes still even sell music? I really miss $0.99 tracks…
They sure do!
Buy used CDs and rip them to FLAC. It’s always high quality and it’s usually cheaper than a digital store. Then you can either keep them or resell them!
(Your local library also likely has a large library of CDs you can check out)
There’s an Apple Music app. I don’t use it, but can’t you buy music through that? Or just through Apple’s website?
Apple Music is more in-line with Spotify. You can’t buy music through it; it’s for streaming only.
Amazon is probably your best bet. I am not sure if they still do this but I bought a few CDs back in 1999 and Amazon added the MP3s to my “owned” library. I found it to be a cool way to own both physical and cloud stored digital copies.
I also found this CNET list that might be useful.
Amazon’s Music app is the worst thing ever conceived. Don’t.
Not Amazon Music the streaming service. Amazon the store. You can (or at least you could) buy your music in MP3 format. I have to check.if you still can.
EDIT: Yes, they still sell MP3s
I see, and you can just download them? If so that’s good. I’ve seen issues where people are struggling to play their purchased music on the Amazon Music app, but if you can download them then that doesn’t matter…
Yes.
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It depends on where you live. Amazon doesn’t sell digital music in Canada.
There’s free good quality music apps on F-Droid, a sort of catalogue where you can side load apps. That’s Android, power to the user!
Here is the link to get F-Droid, https://f-droid.org/
If you are on Android just pirate it, answer “I wanna pirate” for more info.
How does this answer OPs question of how to buy music?
Cos you don’t need to buy it if you can pirate it?
But you might wanna support the artists :)
You don’t need to be on android to play pirated music. OP clearly is more interested in supporting the artists.
Support the artists ? Buying from Apple (or Amazon etc) sees you supporting Apple, supporting the publisher, the RIAA. The Artist is at the end of a long chain of grifters and middle men taking their pound of flesh… I’d love to support the artists, if I could donate directly to them. The ones who aren’t, like Taylor Swift don’t need more supoort.
That’s actually a surprise to me, seeing how they wouldn’t let people sideload. Can’t believe the app store would allow pirates.
There’s no security implications with allowing users to play mp3 files, they don’t care where they came from. 75% of my library is music that I either pirated or ripped from my own CDs, it’s not like iTunes (now Music) can tell which is mine and which isn’t. Same thing with movies/tv shows.
