YouTube Music now lets you search for songs by humming, singing or playing a tune

After about a year of testing, YouTube Music has rolled out a new feature allowing users to search for songs by humming, singing, or playing a tune directly into the app.

The sound search feature, accessible through a waveform icon in the search bar, taps into YouTube Music’s catalog of over 100 million official songs to find matches. It’s available to YouTube Music subscribers on iOS and Android.

A YouTube Music spokesperson confirmed the rollout to Music Business Worldwide via an emailed statement. “We hope to bring this to even more YouTube Music users in the future,” the spokesperson added.

Last year, Google – which, like YouTube, is owned by Alphabet – unveiled MusicLM, an ‘experimental AI’ tool that can generate high-fidelity music from text prompts and humming.

In addition to the new search feature, YouTube Music is experimenting with AI-generated conversational radio for its Premium subscribers in the US. This new feature allows users to create custom radio stations by verbally describing their desired music preferences.

These new capabilities are part of a broader set of enhancements YouTube Music has introduced recently. Back in October, YouTube Music launched an experimental feature that lets users create personalized playlist art using artificial intelligence.

Another new feature launched less than a year ago is the Samples tab, which offers a personalized stream of short song snippets. Users can swipe through recommendations, discover new music, and save songs or music videos to their library, YouTube Music said.

Earlier this year, the app celebrated a milestone of 100 million paid subscribers. YouTube Music offers two subscription options: a standalone plan focused solely on music streaming, and a bundled package included with the YouTube Premium subscription, which provides additional benefits across the entire YouTube platform.

The introduction of these features comes as YouTube Music faces increasing competition from other music streaming services, including Spotify. In March, Spotify launched full-length music videos in beta for its Premium users across 11 markets, intensifying the race to provide more comprehensive music experiences.

YouTube Music says it aims to enhance user engagement through its new features, making it easier for users to discover and enjoy music. The app not only offers over songs, covers, remixes, and live performances, but also integrates with users’ YouTube preferences and recommendations, the company said in a blog post on Friday (July 12).

The app’s “Your music tuner” feature allows users to build radio stations by selecting up to 30 favorite artists and adjusting preferences for variety, familiarity, and new releases.

The YouTube Music player enhances the listening experience with features like radio steering, timed lyrics for sing-alongs, and a comments section for connecting with fellow music lovers. Users can also engage with tracks through likes and shares, the platform added.

Music Business Worldwide