New YouTube Music Streaming Service in the Works

YouTube has essentially become the new MTV. With the high profile music video releases, perhaps it was inevitable that YouTube would eventually try its hand at a music streaming service. In June, YouTube received a lot of criticism about contract negotiations with indie labels, and now we see why those negotiations were taking place: YouTube Music Key.

AndroidPolice.com leaked screenshots from the forthcoming app, which detailed how the service will work. “It looks like YouTube Music Key will offer ad-free music, audio-only playback (for background or screen-off listening) and offline playback,” writes AndroidPolice contributor Liam Spradlin.

Google already had a music streaming service, which allowed users to purchase music from the Play store and stream it. The plan is to re-brand the service as “Google Play Music Key,” which would work in conjunction with the new YouTube Music Key service. The service will cost $9.99 a month for unlimited access to “over 20 million high-quality tracks — complete albums, organized into artist discographies.”

It is likely that the service won’t be available until Google completes negotiations with artists and labels, and there may be other factors at play that delay a potential release. The head of YouTube music quit last month, which was a “huge loss” for the company.

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