December 21, 2022 at 5:48 p.m. PST
- Apple Music offers over 100 million songs for a monthly subscription fee.
- Apple Music includes access to high-res, lossless music with every plan.
- You can use Apple Music on various devices, including your iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, Apple TV, or Windows PC.
- If you’re using a new device or haven’t signed in recently, you may need to re-enter your Apple ID and password to use Apple Music.
What is Apple Music?
Apple Music is a premium music streaming platform. Unlike Spotify, Apple Music offers songs in high-resolution, lossless format, with many tracks streamed in 24-bit audio. Apple Music sounds almost as good as the studio master, if played on the right equipment.
Apple Music costs $10.99 per month for the average user. While this may seem expensive, the subscription fee is slightly more than buying an album every month. I still remember paying $15.99 for CDs a few decades ago. With family plans and student pricing, Apple Music is a remarkable deal.
Like most music streaming platforms, you can play Apple Music on various devices, including an iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, Apple TV, HomePod Android smartphone, smart speakers, and virtually any computer equipped with a web browser.
Since Apple Music can run on so many devices, I could write an epic about it. For the sake of brevity, we’ll look at how to sign in to Apple Music on an iPhone and web browser. The process is similar on every other device.
This article assumes that you already have an Apple Music subscription. If not, please sign up for a free trial on Apple’s website. You can also subscribe by launching the Music app on your iPhone or iPad and following the on-screen instructions.
How to Sign In to Apple Music with a Web Browser
When Apple Music first launched, it was only available on Apple devices. The company eventually made it available to Android phones, replacing the Beats Music app for Google’s mobile operating system. Now you can stream Apple Music on many devices, including most web browsers.
Streaming Apple Music on a web browser comes in handy. If you’re at a friend’s house or party, you can sign in to your Apple Music account on a Mac, Windows, or ChromeOS computer.
Here’s how to sign in to Apple Music on most web browsers:
- First, open a web browser and navigate to https://music.apple.com. The Apple Music website appears.
- Click on “Sign In” on the top right corner. A panel appears, prompting you to enter your Apple ID.
- Enter your Apple ID and click on the arrow icon. The password field appears.
- Enter your password.
At this point, the workflow changes depending on whether you’re using your personal Mac, Windows, or someone else’s computer. If you’re using your Mac, you will see an alert that your Apple ID is being used on a new device. Click “Allow” and then enter the code on the screen to continue. A panel appears asking if you want to trust the browser. If you’re using a public computer, clicking “Don’t Trust” is best. If it’s your own Mac, feel free to trust it.
The final steps are slightly different if you use any computer besides your own Mac. Instead of your Mac presenting the 6-digit authentication code, this interaction will take place on your Apple devices or through an SMS message.
After you sign in to Apple Music on, for example, a Windows PC, it will send a message to your iPhone to allow access and then present the 6-digit code. If you don’t own an iPhone, click on the link for other verification code options. You can send an SMS to the phone number used by your Apple account.
When you get the 6-digit code as a text message, enter it in the web browser. You’ll be asked whether you should trust the browser. If this is a public computer, click on “Don’t Trust”. Otherwise, you can trust the browser, and you won’t have to enter the 6-digit code again unless you’re using an incognito or private browser window. Since these modes don’t store cookies, Apple Music won’t record that the browser is trusted, so you’ll need to go through the entire process with the 6-digit code every time.
Tip: If you’re using a public computer, it’s best to use a private or incognito window when you sign in to Apple Music. This way, your account will automatically log off as soon as the window closes.
How to Sign In to Apple Music on Your iPhone
For the most part, Apple Music will always work on your iPhone, and you won’t need to sign in. Since you’re signed into your iPhone with your Apple ID, it’s unlikely that Apple Music will prompt for authentication.
There are some cases where Apple will require authentication. If you reset your iPhone, you will need to re-enter your Apple ID. Also, after major iOS updates, your Apple device may require Apple ID authentication. Sometimes I’ve seen it pop up randomly for no apparent reason, but not in a few years. That seems to be an old bug that they fixed, but it’s possible for software to regress.
Signing in to Apple Music on your iPhone is easy. Let’s take a look at how to do it:
- Tap on the Music app. iOS will ask you to sign in with your Apple ID.
- Enter your Apple ID and password.
That’s it. Because you’re using your iPhone, there’s no code to enter. The six-digit code is only for non-Apple devices or when using a web browser on a Mac.