from Hacker News

Ambient music on iOS 18.4 and the return to the Apple's Music app

by rpgbr on 4/10/25, 12:26 PM with 39 comments

  • by sillywalk on 4/13/25, 4:57 AM

    The Apple Music app on macos is one of the most horrible UI things I can think of.

    Search: You must scroll to the top of the playlists, it's not in the toolbar and always clickable. ALSO: the switch between local/downloaded and all Apple Music is on the Other side of the Screen. It's pseudo-browse ( the back button is inline with the content, and there isn't a Forward button).

    I haven't been able to find a way to not show the default view that takes up half the screen. It has an image of the album cover and some flat-ux "buttons" and a checkmark icon, plus a (...) and a 1/4 of the screen just empty.

  • by mgkimsal on 4/13/25, 2:35 AM

    It's not explicitly called out anywhere, but you can have this and the 'background noise' running at the same time. This 'chill' music with some dark noise mixed in is great.

  • by dangus on 4/13/25, 4:23 AM

    It is a really bad piece of Apple marketing and naming that so many people don’t realize that Music the app and Music the subscription service are two different things.

    The service and subscription can be turned off and disabled entirely, hidden from view in the Music app (formerly known as iTunes).

    Apple’s old iPod sync workflow still works to this day (on your modern iPhone or on your old iPod), the iTunes Store is still a thing, and yes your computer can still rip CDs. I would even argue that it has greatly improved now that a lot of the functions complicating the experience like Podcasts and TV shows have been moved to other more appropriate apps.

    All of this stuff not only still exists but Apple is about the only mainstream name in the business that will give you a decent music jukebox and digital music store experience anymore. So many other options are gone and the jukebox app landscape is quite bleak.

  • by pram on 4/13/25, 6:40 AM

    If you’re using the Music app and putting your collection into it consider buying the itunes match subscription. This automatically uploads all your songs and syncs them to all your devices. I download ALACs from albums I buy on Bandcamp and put them into Music, it’s definitely the best feature.

    https://support.apple.com/en-us/108935

  • by pretext-1 on 4/13/25, 7:19 AM

    > My excitement soon turned to frustration when I discovered that the Music app had to be installed for the iOS 18.4 ambient music feature to work.

    Not true. I don’t have the Music app installed and ambient music works fine. It does not play in the Music app, it has it’s own lightweight media player UI which looks almost the same but is separate from the Music app.

  • by thehoff on 4/13/25, 2:56 AM

    I don’t have Apple Music installed, tried this and it works fine for me.

  • by damnesian on 4/10/25, 3:25 PM

    Anyone know if there is something like this for Linux? I like the idea, but don't use a Mac. Sure, I can collect ambient music and loop them in Rhythmbox bt I love the idea of a background music utility to enhance work.