Report: Amazon to launch new music streaming service within weeks

Amazon is reportedly due to introduce a new version of its Prime music streaming service in the coming weeks.

According to a New York Times report, Amazon is due to introduce a music service with a “full catalogue” that will be available in the US for US$10 per month.

Customers of Amazon’s voice-activated speaker system, Echo, will be able to access the service for roughly half the price, said the NYT.

Amazon currently offers Amazon Prime customers in the US, UK, Germany and Japan unlimited, access to over one million songs and thousands of playlists and stations. However, it does not currently offer the service on a stand-alone basis like music streaming rivals Spotify and Apple Music.

A Prime subscription in the states costs US$10.99 per month or US$99 a year, and also includes free two-day shipping on physical goods, access to more than a million ebooks, unlimited photo storage, and access to movies and TV shows through Prime Video.

Reuters reported in June that Amazon would launch a US$9.99 per-month standalone music streaming service towards the end of summer or early autumn, reporting at the time that label deals were being finalised.

Amazon launched Prime Video as a standalone, pay-monthly service for the first time in the US in April, charging US$8.99 per-month for the SVOD service and undercutting rival Netflix by US$1 per-month.

In the UK, a monthly subscription option for Prime Video, priced at £5.99 per-month, has been available since Amazon launched Prime Video there in 2014, as this continued over from the LoveFilm Instant package.

The NYT also reported that US music streaming service Pandora will also launch an expanded version of its US$5 per-month service – possibly as early as this week.