Guess How Much You'll Have To Pay For YouTube's Subscription Service

YouTube announced today that it will release YouTube Music Key (YTMK), Google’s ad-free subscription music service which will attempt to challenge Spotify, Pandora, and Apple radio.

Price of YouTube Music Key

Right now it’s being reported that YouTube will launch in a test mode at the price of $7.99, with invitations first being sent to big fans of music on YouTube. After the test phase is complete, the cost will be $9.99–which is the same price as Spotify Premium.

Release Date of YouTube Music Key

Google hasn’t released an official release date for the $9.99 version of YouTube Music Key, but the good news is that we’ve got a link for you that will allow you to apply for a beta test here. And yes, it’s live as of today.

YouTube Music Key Beta Announcement Video

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMQxeb5ERps&w=590]

Shoutout to Ice JJ Fish for making the official YouTube announcement

YouTube Music Key Features

The service will almost certainly replace “Google Music,” Google’s earlier music player which we weren’t too excited about. But like Google Music, YouTube Music Key will have offline play available. It will also have background audio available, in case you want to listen to music while you’re on the phone.

On the official blog and announcement, YouTube boasts that it has a music library containing over 30+ million songs and will allow for watching YouTube videos right from the app. And perhaps most amazingly, if you turn your screen off the music will keep playing. I’ve lost count the amount of times I’ve screwed this up.

What This Means For The Future of YouTube

A lot of insiders have theorized that the reason for creating YouTube Music Key is because YouTube is figuring out whether a subscription service for music can translate into a subscription service for video.