Shazam Brings Back Unlimited Tagging in Free iPhone App

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Music identification service Shazam was one of the early hits on the App Store, with the company's free iPhone application seeing 1.5 million downloads over the first few months of availability.

Shazam shifted gears slightly in November 2009, introducing a paid Shazam Encore application and limiting new users of the free application to only five tags per month. Users who had used the free application before that time were grandfathered in and have continued to have access to unlimited tagging.

But today, Shazam announced that it has brought back unlimited tagging for all users in the free application, relying on an ad-supported model.

Andrew Fisher, Shazam CEO said, “Shazamers already identify over 1 billion songs each year and go on to purchase over $100 million in digital music via our service. Now, with no limits, people can Shazam even more songs they don’t know – or they already know - to conveniently purchase them, see the lyrics, watch the official music video, share on Facebook, Twitter or email, get recommendations and purchase concert tickets instantly. Unlimited free access means people can use Shazam even more as part of their daily lives.”

The paid Shazam Encore continues to offer some benefits over the free application, including an ad-free experience and features such as LyricPlay, which allows users to view song lyrics as the tracks play.

Top Rated Comments

xii

120 months ago

Isn't soundhound better? In my opinion it hits better.

Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)

1080p

Meh. Soundhound is better. I can usually get Soundhound to detect music across the room with ambient room noise/chatter. Shazam usually cannot.

On average, I can get Soundhound to detect the song with 5-8 second snippets of music. Shazam needs MUCH more time.

And OG users will remember Soundhound as Midomi. :cool:

Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)

interestedabit

Can I be *that whining git*? Just paid 5 euros for full version so I had unlimited tagging. Now this..

Oh well.

Not the end of the world. Just unlucky.

Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)

jav6454

The whole grandfathered thing is bull crap. I was a user who downloaded Shazam when it came out.

I was grandfathered, but only for a short period. After which Shazam put a limit on me. Complete and utter BS. I dumped that crap and switched to SoundHound which gets it right always.

Oh, and SoundHound does not crash.

Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)

BJMRamage

I got Shazam and SoundHound when both had a 5 song limit per month.
Then SoundHound switched to unlimited.
I used that almost exclusively.
Then I was given a FREE Shazam code (via Starbucks)
I now have unlimited for both and only used them each once since then.

Good for all users...except those that just bought the Encore version.

Score: 1 Votes (Like | Disagree)