Friday I told the OP that I would test whether two Macs can play Apple Music simultaneously.
Just following up.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Apple music on Multiple devices
- Thread starter Apple blogger
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Friday I told the OP that I would test whether two Macs can play Apple Music simultaneously.
Just following up.
You did NOT disclose you had a family account (until today) and lead the OP to believe by posting that you had a single user account and was playing on multiple devices. OP has a single user account so a Family account playing on multiple devices (as it should and ALL family plans do) is 100% NA to this thread.
Last edited:
In all honesty I only read the first few posts in the thread and so was unaware different limits existed between the subscription types.
I just saw the OP with an issue and thought I’d lend a hand by spending my own spare time testing something.
My bad. Glad to see you’ve all got it figured out anyway.
One person
Even though we have 2 earsit is NOT possible to listen to two or more music tracks at the same time. So over than allowing others to 'steal' music while you listen to something different what would be the point in having a different music track playing on a different device at the same time for JUST you?
Multi-tasking causes even me problems at times as well
It's okay if you had a family plan, it still brought out more clarity ☺️ Thanks for your help...
[doublepost=1508729008][/doublepost]
It's okay, atleast he gave a final confirmation that family plan works with upto 6 devices..
So now we know, that a family plan works in 2 ways:
1. Multiple Apple ID on different devices,
2. Multiple devices with a same Apple ID..
But, the worst part is, that this is not reflected in the support document, and neither the support staff have a clear answer to this...
[doublepost=1508729381][/doublepost]
@Apple blogger, @Brookzy's original answer was the correct one. Get a family plan. That gets you 6 concurrent sessions. They can be used by up to 6 Apple ID's or just one. I was previously on a friend's family plan....was how I was able to have music playing on my mac, Apple TV and iPhone at the same time.
Apple does NOT limit Apple ID's to a single session - except on the single user subscription.
As for the Mac and iPhone thing - there used to be race conditions with Sierra and iOS 10 that you could get around that with a single user account. Seems much more tightly integrated on HS and iOS 11.
Oh...and as to why a single user would want this? You have the music playing at your apartment, friends are over, you run out to grab a few things from the store. You jump in your car and turn on the tunes....boom!
Me, I think they should give single users two sessions....also you could have the Apple TV in the bedroom playing one thing and the Mac Mini connected to your AV receiver in the living room playing something else.
Okay, that's a great confirmation! Thank you! So now it's known family plan can be used for upto 6 devices too with the same Apple ID... but, what about this then.. brianbaughn (above) said that he was on a single plan, and he could still have 2 sessions... this defeats your answer.. he played it on 3 devices (2 macs and 1 iPhone) with a single plan,
But u said that it's not possible now with high serria and iOS 11.. so it's because he was on the earlier version?
[doublepost=1508729429][/doublepost]Thank you guys for all the help☺️ If Apple only provided a better support document, all this mess wouldn't be created
Nope, it doesn't. We had 6 people setup on his family plan. The only reason that I was able to get 3 devices going concurrently with my Apple ID was that there were at least 3 sessions available. It's concurrent sessions. If all 6 are in use and another one gets lit up someone will get bumped.
Edit: The "rule" you're looking for is "last one in wins" - if you have 7 devices trying to get sessions, they'll keep bumping each other off until one of them gives up.
(and likely sends a fiery e-mail to the others) I have a couple questions regarding Apple Music...I have a family subscription and I would like to add my parents. However, I dont want music that they nor I add to show up on each device...does it work that way? In addition, I dont want calendars and storage to be shared with them. Does this happen when you add them to Apple Music?