While we are still waiting for Spotify to arrive in high definition (if it ever arrives), its competitors have not stood still. One of the most interesting alternatives is YouTube Music, which offers a very similar experience in terms of sound quality and music discovery, but is included with a subscription that many users already pay for, that of YouTube Premium.
The advantage of YouTube Music is that is “free” with YouTube Premiumso if you already paid the subscription to remove YouTube ads, you may have less reason to continue paying for the Spotify subscription. The latest news from YouTube Music makes it very clear that Google intends to take on Spotify directly, as it is “copying” one of its biggest new features: Spotify DJ.
Spotify DJ was introduced when generative AI became trendy, and every company wanted to display this technology in their apps. In Spotify’s case, in the form of a “personal DJ” able to understand the music we want to listen to at a given moment and create a personalized playlist; like a personal radio.
The feature that some YouTube Music users are discovering is very similar. It’s an “experiment” that allows “Request music the way you want it” and it appears as a new section within the YouTube Music mobile app.
If we click on this section, a chat like Gemini or ChatGPT opensin which we can tell the AI what kind of music we want to listen to, such as a musical genre or songs similar to others. Based on what we asked, YouTube Music will generate a unique playlist for us, with songs that match our request. In addition, the app will show suggestions at the bottom of the requests we can make to discover new music or listen to our favorite songs again; this will also allow us to adjust our initial request to make it more specific, although a notice in the fine print warns that “quality and accuracy may vary” depending on what we ask.
The list thus generated can be saved with the rest to listen to it whenever we want. So it is very similar to Spotify DJ, except for one detail: Spotify also introduces an AI-generated voice that introduces the songs, like a regular radio DJ, and this is something that, at least for now, Google has not implemented. However, the company has not officially announced the launch of this feature, so it is very likely that it will be improved thanks to the feedback of the first users who use it before it reaches everyone.
