Google has unveiled a new YouTube-based music streaming service which will compete with Spotify and Apple’s Beats Music.
YouTube Music Key will allow users to play music videos offline, in the background of the device and without advertisements for €10 per month.
The company is also adding a ‘music’ section to its homepage and mobile apps, which it says will make it easier for regular users to find recommended and trending music or playlists.
YouTube’s premium service is priced at the same level as Spotify’s, which offers access to a large catalogue of music for €10 per month.
A free, ad-supported version of Spotify is also available to users, though it lacks a number of the premium service’s features.
Beats Music, owned by Apple following its $3bn acquisition of the headphone-maker, is not available in Ireland but charges US customers $10 per month for access to its curated music catalogue.
The launch of YouTube Music Key comes after The Financial Times this morning reported that the video sharing site had struck a deal with a group of independent record labels for its new service.
The Google-owned online media service came to an agreement with rights agency Merlin following months of negotiations, the newspaper said, citing sources familiar with the matter.
Merlin declined to comment on the report.
Record labels representing 95% of the music industry had already signed up to the new terms to facilitate the service but Merlin, which represents more than 20,000 labels from 39 countries, had been holding out.
YouTube earlier this year threatened to block the videos of artists like Adele and the Arctic Monkeys on its free site if they did not sign up to the terms of the subscription service.
YouTube is the world's biggest online source of free streaming music and the site has around one billion users a month.
