Apple Music rolls out in India starting at Rs 120: Here's what you need to know

As promised,  Apple Music is now available for users in India. With the release of iOS 8.4, the new service is made accessible in 100 countries and India hasn’t been ignored. Before taking the plunge, the company will allow a free trial period of three months. After that you will have to pay Rs 120 per month for individual accounts and Rs 190 per month for a group account of up to six people. Interestingly, it is much cheaper here considering the US pricing for $9.99 and $14.99 for individual and group of six, respectively. Apple Music is available on iOS devices, as well as Mac and PC. The company is also expected to launch it for Android soon.  Just like most other similar services, it will allow users to stream music across genres such as Dance, Pop, Rock, Bollywood and so on. During the launch, the company had promised over 30 million songs. For Indian music, looks like Apple has tied up with Sony Music, Zee Music, Universal Music, to name a few. Interestingly, the leading Indian label T-series seems to be missing from the list, points out ET Tech. Apple Music service looks into three main parameters – discovering and downloading music, the Beats 1 radio service and Connect feature. It comes with new sections like – For You, New, Radio and Connect. An all time open Search tab will allow searching for genre, songs or album of your choice. The app will ask users what kind of music it prefers and also choose from regional languages. It will then populate the ‘For You’ section with some specially curated playlists. Apple Music is believed to be all about curating playlists. It is also said to be more of human work than some algorithm. So, it is quite likely that the more you listen to music; it will curate playlists that suit users the best. In the live radio section, you will be limited to a Bollywood station and a Tamil station. However, you will find several other station classified on the basis of genres, but playing international music. Social media is one of the prime features, whether it’s a health app or music app. The Apple Music also offers the ‘connect’ section to follow the artists of your choice. If you are a social media fanatic then maybe you should key in a cool nickname in the user profile section. Tech critics already seem to have given it a thumps up, but some did find getting around a little confusing. “My first impression of Apple Music is that it’s the most full-featured streaming music app I’ve seen – and heard – and the first I’d consider paying for. But it may overwhelm some users, and I’ll need to live with it more before I can reach final conclusions,” Re/code‘s Walt Mossberg concludes. “With live radio, human curated playlists and access to your iTunes purchase history, I’m really liking Apple Music,” concludes Mashable. **Read on** to know what the tech critics are saying. Some users in India took to Twitter expressing their views on the new service. https://twitter.com/PranavDixit/status/615928401791070208 https://twitter.com/SrikarDR/status/615785455057944576 https://twitter.com/gsurya/status/616101544279195648