Since I’ve been trapped inside my house every day for a month, I have listened to music much more than normal. While I’m very happy with Apple Music, there are some features that I’m finding I would love added to the service.

I would love if Apple Music could add these features.

Personal Recommendations in Apple Music

Every day, Apple Music selects content that you might interest you in the For You section of Apple Music. The selection is usually pretty good, but have you ever noticed that Apple Music doesn’t present any playlists that you created nor music that you’ve added to your library?

That’s because they only put Music that is in the Apple Music catalog. Anything that you’ve uploaded won’t appear there unless it has been matched.

I’m not sure how they could do it, but I would love it if Apple Music would recommend that I listen to a playlist that I made but hadn’t listened to in a while or a live album that I have in my collection that I listen to frequently.

If some stuff from my library shows up though, especially if I haven’t listened to it in a while, I am more likely to pick it.

Ability to Trigger A Match

When iTunes Match rolled out, I signed up right away. Match scans through the library and matches songs in your library to its iTunes counterpart. If it didn’t find a match it uploaded songs to iCloud. Before streaming music services, this was great for iPhones with limited space.

But when iTunes Match launched, there were issues with the matching service. Albums that I ripped from CDs wouldn’t match, or most songs would but one or two wouldn’t. Making matters worse, Apple didn’t include an ability to trigger another round of matching.

For iTunes Match, it wasn’t that big a deal since you still had a master on a device. Now that Apple Music has come around and taken on what iTunes Match did, things have become more complicated.

Many popular songs in my library haven’t and won’t match to their Apple Music counterpart. This means that Apple Music doesn’t see me listening to uploaded songs which can screw up recommendations.

Also, you can create playlists with Apple Music, matched, and uploaded content, but when you share those playlists the uploaded songs don’t show up.

None of this is really a huge deal, but it is annoying. There’s no easy way to get the Music app to trigger a new search through the catalog to match songs. The only way is to add new music, and then, it only matches those songs.

The Workaround

I have found one workaround though. I will download music that has been uploaded music to my library on my Mac. Then I delete it from my library on my iPhone. It will show up in my library on my Mac as Removed. A simple right-click and add to the Library. This causes Music to check the database and sometimes you get matches.

It would be amazing if Apple could add a feature that would check your uploaded music with Apple Music, or let you select uploaded songs to check. Within the past month, the Dave Matthews Band has released over ten live albums to streaming services that weren’t on Apple Music when launched. I owned a few of those live shows but had to go through this process to get them to match.

It would have been nice if Music could have done that for me when it was added.

Up Next on iCloud

Working from home can get rough. I spend most of my day in my office but there are times when I want a change of scenery. That change has created a pain point: a lack of a consistent flow in Music.

I would love for Apple to implement either Handoff or an Up Next in iCloud system that can be used on all your iCloud devices.

Apple Music already keeps track of the albums and playlists that you listen to. It will present them to you on the For You page. But it doesn’t tell you where you left off nor does it show you your uploaded stuff you’ve listened to.

Since music has moved to streaming, I’m surprised that Apple hasn’t added handoff to anything other than the HomePod. You can bring your iPhone close to a HomePod and your currently playing music will transfer to the speaker.

It would be cool if I could build my Play Next list on my Mac and then just bring my iPhone close to it when I need to be on the move. Or even just let me use Handoff to transfer the music.

Or how about allowing me to use iCould music to access Play Next lists from another device. If I built something on my iPhone and want to transfer it to my Mac, all I would need to do is open the Play Next list and look for an iCloud tab. Apple has currently built out a web player for Apple music, so it seems like they could bring in an iCloud Up Next feature.

It would make it easy to continue listening to whatever it was I was listening to. Instead, I have to hunt through my library and try to remember where I was before.

Simple Solutions

Right now, I’ve been stubborn. I could easily create a daily playlist that I update while I listen. As my needs evolve, this is probably what I will end up doing. As it is, using the Up Next is just muscle memory.

Plus a playlist is good, but it doesn’t help track where I am in the playlist. The Up Next handles all that for me.

Wrap up

I love Apple Music. I also love that I have gotten to listen to more music than ever before, but there are pain points. The Music apps would become so much better if Apple could add these features.

What are some of your biggest hang ups with the Music App? Let me know in the comments!