Apple Music FAQ: features included with paid subscription, what happens to iTunes Match and Radio, migrating from Beats Music, and more
Apple Music FAQ: Everything you need to know — Apple Music is coming June 30. We've got the beats and the deets.
Context & Ripple Effects
On the eve of the June 30 launch, this FAQ consolidates what Apple has been building toward since spring: the exclusive artist deals signed to promote Beats Music's summer relaunch are now folded into Apple Music, which carries the same $9.99 individual and $14.99 family pricing reported earlier.
The FAQ also settles open questions for two existing audiences — Beats Music users facing a migration path to Apple Music ahead of the service's November 30 fade-out, and iTunes Match and Radio owners asking whether their features survive the transition.
First-order effects
- Beats Music subscribers get an official route into Apple Music rather than starting over, with their playlists and data carried across before the old service shuts down on November 30.
- iTunes Match and Radio customers learn exactly which features stay free, which fold into the $9.99 subscription, and which change shape under Apple Music.
Second-order effects
- Competing services at the $10 price point now face Apple's family plan at $14.99 plus exclusive artist content as a bundle they must answer on both price and catalog.
- Free iTunes Radio listening becomes a funnel toward the paid tier, as Apple later confirmed by moving the station behind the $10/month paywall.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, Apple consolidates its scattered audio products — Beats Music, iTunes Radio, iTunes Match — into one subscription, making the paid tier the default way to access music on Apple devices and shrinking the space for standalone or free tiers.
The trend: Apple is collapsing its fragmented music offerings into a single paid streaming subscription, using exclusives and migration paths to pull existing listeners onto one tier.