Apple Explains Why It Launched an iPhone App Dedicated to Classical Music

Monday March 27, 2023 8:54 pm PDT by Joe Rossignol

Apple today published a support document explaining why it decided to release a standalone Apple Music Classical app for classical music.

Apple Music Classical
In short, Apple says the app was designed to support classical music's complex metadata:

Classical music is different. It has longer and more detailed titles, multiple artists for each work, and hundreds of recordings of well-known pieces. The Apple Music Classical app is designed to support the complex data structure of classical music.

Apple offers a longer explanation on a new Apple Music Classical page:

Classical music often involves multiple musicians recording works that have been recorded many times before and are referred to by different names. For example, from the formal Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 14 to the popular byname of Moonlight Sonata, or in multiple languages, such as Mondschein Sonata in German. Such complexities mean that classical music fans have been ill-served by streaming platforms. Until now. A distinct app, included with an Apple Music subscription, gives these classical music lovers the editorial and catalog content they've been missing.

Only a brand-new app — with specialized features and a beautiful interface designed for the genre — could remove the complexity and make classical music easily searchable, browsable, and accessible for beginners and experts alike.

The support document provides answers to some other frequently asked questions about the app, which began rolling out today. Much of the information relates to how the Apple Music Classical app integrates with the standard Apple Music app.

Apple also shared a video overview of the app on YouTube:

Apple Music Classical offers over five million classical music tracks and is free to use with a standard Apple Music subscription on iOS 15.4 and later. The app is based on Primephonic, a classical music streaming service that Apple acquired in 2021. The app is available for the iPhone only at launch, with an Android version coming soon.

Tags: Apple Music Guide, Apple Music Classical

Popular Stories

Apple's CarPlay Ultra to Expand to These Vehicle Brands Later This Year

Sunday February 1, 2026 10:08 am PST by Joe Rossignol

Last year, Apple launched CarPlay Ultra, the long-awaited next-generation version of its CarPlay software system for vehicles. Nearly nine months later, CarPlay Ultra is still limited to Aston Martin's latest luxury vehicles, but that should change fairly soon. In May 2025, Apple said many other vehicle brands planned to offer CarPlay Ultra, including Hyundai, Kia, and Genesis. In his Powe...

• 86 comments

Apple Just Made Its Second-Biggest Acquisition Ever After Beats

Thursday January 29, 2026 10:07 am PST by Joe Rossignol

Apple today confirmed to Reuters that it has acquired Q.ai, an Israeli startup that is working on artificial intelligence technology for audio. Apple paid close to $2 billion for Q.ai, according to sources cited by the Financial Times. That would make this Apple's second-biggest acquisition ever, after it paid $3 billion for the popular headphone and audio brand Beats in 2014. Q.ai has...

• 134 comments

Apple's Next Launch is 'Imminent'

Sunday February 1, 2026 12:31 pm PST by Joe Rossignol

The calendar has turned to February, and a new report indicates that Apple's next product launch is "imminent," in the form of new MacBook Pro models. "All signs point to an imminent launch of next-generation MacBook Pros that retain the current form factor but deliver faster chips," Bloomberg's Mark Gurman said on Sunday. "I'm told the new models — code-named J714 and J716 — are slated...

Apple Changes How You Order a Mac

Saturday January 31, 2026 10:51 am PST by Joe Rossignol

Apple recently updated its online store with a new ordering process for Macs, including the MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, iMac, Mac mini, Mac Studio, and Mac Pro. There used to be a handful of standard configurations available for each Mac, but now you must configure a Mac entirely from scratch on a feature-by-feature basis. In other words, ordering a new Mac now works much like ordering an...

• 127 comments

New MacBook Pros Reportedly Launching Alongside macOS 26.3

Sunday February 1, 2026 5:42 am PST by Joe Rossignol

Apple is planning to launch new MacBook Pro models with M5 Pro and M5 Max chips alongside macOS 26.3, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. "Apple's faster MacBook Pros are planned for the macOS 26.3 release cycle," wrote Gurman, in his Power On newsletter today. "I'm told the new models — code-named J714 and J716 — are slated for the macOS 26.3 software cycle, which runs from...

• 136 comments

Top Rated Comments

sniffies

37 months ago

Hopefully Apple's Classical Music app will pique the interest of growing youth and help them appreciate the beauty of classical music, moving them closer to it, and further away from the vanity of tiktoks and instagrams.

Score: 45 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Mac47

37 months ago

Needs an iPad app, too. It was kind of gross opening it on my iPad Pro without realizing that it was just the iPhone app.

Score: 26 Votes (Like | Disagree)

carswell

37 months ago

The app was automatically loaded to my iPhone at 10 p.m. EDT on Monday. First impression is that it seems a lot like a skin on a subset of Apple Music.

First search test did not inspire confidence.
- Typed “Beethoven symphony 2” (sans quotes) in the search box and the works (as opposed to albums) listed were the composer’s symphonies nos. 5, 9, 6, 7 and 3 along with, I assume, the number of recordings or tracks of each.
- Under that is a See All Works link. Selecting it takes you to a page that lists the symphonies as above followed by 8, 2 (finally!), 1, 4 and 10 (?!).
- Select 2 and you’re presented with a preliminary list of recordings, including an unexplained/unjustified Editor’s Choice (Berlin Phil under Rattle, no thanks), followed by a list of five Popular Recordings and a See All link.
- Select that and you finally get to the list of 500-odd albums that can be sorted by Popularity (the default), Name, Release Date or Duration. Lots of big name European and American orchestras under big name conductors, though you’ll have scroll through several screens before you come across a period instrument performance (Gardiner’s, with Savall's excellent performance coming a few more screens below that).

This is lame from start to finish and not that much better than Apple Music.

I used to subscribe to Idagio. Searching it for Beethoven symphony 2 presented you with a results page in two parts: a list of all the recordings and another list of the ensembles, the conductors and, for things like concertos and chamber music, the individual musicians. You want to hear Toscanini’s recording with the NBC Symphony Orchestra? You select NBC or Toscanini and bingo.

Searching Apple Classical for Turandot turns up scads of albums and tracks (all together in a single list…) but not the just released Warner recording with Radvanovsky and Kaufmann. To get that, I had to type Turandot Pappano (the conductor). Neither it nor the recently released William Christie-conducted Platée from Vienna had liner notes, let alone libretti. For new recordings, Idagio often had both in PDF format.

First impressions, I admit, but so far a disappointment. Plus, though there's lots of stuff in lossless and hi-res, I've no way to play it back in anything but mid-res (Sonos, which does hi-res with Qobuz and Amazon, and AirPod Pros).

Score: 19 Votes (Like | Disagree)