Apple Music vs iTunes Match - my experience

[karnsculpture]

So I've been with Match since it was first launched, and mostly had a great time with it, very useful.

When Apple Music launched I waited a while (as I had an active Match subscription) but then joined and that's when the pain started. As many others have reported it affected my carefully curated collection and as soon as I thought everything was fixed, something else would go wrong. My most recent issue, since getting a new iPhone 7+, was tracks not downloading to devices (but streaming fine). I also had a lot of issues adding new tracks to my iCloud Music Library - taking days to upload and so on.

Eventually I realised I wasn't using the Apple Music service much as a lot of new albums I wanted to get were not becoming available. I am in the UK but I am interested in Japanese music - what's available is very hit and miss and depends on the labels agreements with Apple. So I decided to cancel Apple Music and rejoin match.

Guess what - everything just works! Tracks upload to iCloud Music Library and the issues I was having downloading to devices are gone. Yes I'm having to rebuild the library a bit as the Apple Music versions of songs are gone - I had a backup so nothing missing.

So, it seems that iTunes Match is now much more reliable than Apple Music - has anyone else experienced both?

 

[Tech198]

iTunes Match is good, but i get value out of Apple music. I found when i used Match, it would be he same as Apple music matching would be, that is iTunes Match would incorrectly tag the wrong track.

The problem with this method on both services, is that if there is no matching album and song ,,,, then it automatically picks out the closest match, which is often a clean version of the song, or something completely different.

A better way of handing these types of issues, if it can't find it, *tell the user that* Since on both services the matching is not much better then the other, u end up with 3/4 of the tracks were "matched" but they were not matched to the same version..

iTunes Match is a little better doing 2/1 which were accurate i found, just by the way it matches

Ya, iTunes match is more reliable... but i'd still have a backup, as you never know what will happen.

Can also be related to the country as well where u have Apple music or iTunes match depends how good it actual is... (e.g more content is U.S,, than elsewhere would give better results for example)

 

[davidg4781]

I wish they could put lyrics on the iTunes Match tracks. Let's say I ask Siri to play Hey Jude, she plays it from my iTunes Match and there are no lyrics. If I search of it through Apple Music, lyrics are there.

I ALMOST did away with iTunes Match, but remembered Apple Music doesn't have all the music I have. For instance, there are only a few songs on the Mambo Kings soundtrack on AM, but I have the entire CD so I get all songs.