Apple Music is a very successful music streaming service with a very interesting catalog, but the apps aren’t very fast. However, the experience can be improved.
The Apple Music app is probably one of the weakest points of Apple’s streaming service. Whether you use it on iPhone or Mac, the app is not known for its speed; Reddit users love to complain about this. If you find it desperately slow, there are a few tricks to speed it up a bit.
Disable social features
Apple Music has a number of social features that should help you discover new music shared by other users. Disabling these features should reduce the load on the application.
To do this on iPhone, open the Listening tab in the Music app and tap your profile icon. Turn off Contacts in Apple Music and “Allow search by Apple ID”. Then tap Notifications and turn off Friends Activity and Artists & Shows.
You can also disable these settings in the Music app on Mac, they are stored in the account menu in the Music app.
These changes should greatly increase the download speed of Apple Music, especially for displaying search results, recommendations, and other pages.
Delete Entire Apple Music Social Profile
If disabling social features isn’t enough to speed up the app, you can delete your Apple Music social profile altogether. You’ll lose access to the Friends Mix playlist and other music recommendations based on what your loved ones are listening to, and public playlists won’t work, but you’ll get speed improvements.
Open the Listening tab again in the Music app and tap your profile icon in the corner. Select Profile, click the Edit button, scroll down and select Delete Profile.
To perform the same operation in the Music app on Mac, click the Listening tab in the sidebar and click your profile icon. Click Edit and select Delete Profile.
This improves the overall performance of the application. The Apple Music download bar appears less frequently, and even with a VPN, songs don’t take as long to play.
Find an alternative Apple Music app
There are many great alternatives for a decent Apple Music experience.
On your iPhone or iPad, you can try apps like Marvis Pro ($7.99) or Soor ($6.99), which let you use the vast majority of Apple Music’s features without the downsides of slowness.
On a Mac or PC, the web version of Apple Music will provide a smoother and more enjoyable experience, especially if you have a fairly old device. Open music.apple.com in your browser, sign in and enjoy your favorite music.