HomePod: All The Music Services That Work With Apple’s Smart Speaker

The Apple HomePod and HomePod mini smart speakers can be used with a few select streaming services, allowing users to easily listen to their favorite songs even if they don’t use Apple Music. It’s an aspect of the HomePod that’s improved since its debut; however, that’s not to say the experience is perfect.

There are many things that the HomePod and HomePod mini do incredibly well. Both speakers sound amazing, integrate seamlessly with other Apple devices, and are some of the better-looking smart speakers available. In typical Apple fashion, though, they’re also considerably more restrictive than smart speakers with Alexa and Google Assistant. Not only is Siri’s functionality behind its competing virtual assistants, but support for third-party apps/services on HomePod leaves a lot to be desired.

Music streaming is a prime example of this. When the HomePod initially launched, users could only ask Siri to play songs from Apple Music. The experience was fantastic for anyone who subscribed to Apple’s streaming service, but it left the millions of other users that didn’t without a solution. Thankfully, that changed in 2020 when Apple added support for third-party music services. In addition to Apple Music, HomePod users can also link accounts from iHeartRadio, Pandora, Deezer, and TuneIn. Once any of these services have been linked, HomePod users can say things like ‘Siri, play rock music on Pandora,’ or ‘Siri, play Twenty One Pilots on Deezer.’ It’s better than restricting people exclusively to Apple Music, but there are also a lot of notable omissions — including Spotify, YouTube Music, Tidal, and Amazon Music. Even worse, there’s no clear timeline for when (or if) these services will be added.

How To Add A Music Service To HomePod

Adding a new music streaming service to HomePod is fairly simple. On an iPhone or iPad, open any of the above apps, go to the app’s settings, and find the option called ‘Connect with HomePod.’ After following the on-screen instructions, it’ll be set up and ready to go.

With this done, HomePod users can ask Siri to play music from the new app by specifying the app name in their request. If they want music to play from the new app without saying its name every time, it needs to be added as the default music service for the HomePod. Open the Home app on an iPhone or iPad,  tap the house icon in the upper-left corner, and then tap ‘Home Settings.’ Tap the preferred user, tap ‘Default Service’ under the Media section, and then select the new default service. If Deezer is selected as the default service, for example, Siri will now use it instead of Apple Music when asked to play a song, album, or playlist.

Source: Apple

About The Author

Joe Maring
(1528 Articles Published)

Joe has been actively writing and talking about consumer tech since 2012. His biggest passion lies with smartphones, but he’s happy to talk your ear off about just about anything with a CPU. He lives in Kalamazoo, MI with his wife, two cats, and pit bull/boxer mix.

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