New YouTube Music Users, What are You Liking and Disliking?

The true end of Google Play Music came yesterday with the final wave of shutdowns helping kick off December and forcing the last remaining users to make their way to YouTube Music. Whether you were ready or not, firing up YouTube Music is now the only choice for a streaming music service provided by Google.

Since so many of you have been forced to make the switch (because you already pay for YouTube Premium), I’m curious if anyone is liking it or if everyone has defaulted to, “This sucks and I’m mad at Google.”

YouTube Music, in my short periods of time with it, didn’t strike me as the worst music service ever created, I just happen to prefer Spotify these days after realizing that Google had given up on Google Play Music so many years ago. YouTube Music has neat integration with lyrics and available videos, if regularly interacting with a music app is something you do. I like the swipe gestures they’ve built in to open and shut the player, the music library seems OK, and I feel like it’s all organized on the front page in a way that makes discovering new stuff pretty easy. Starting radio stations is easy, creating playlists or managing queues is simple, and I’m not sure I find it to be missing much.

My biggest complaint is still the lack of Sonos Casting, which is an absurd omission. I can’t say that I love the way it imported my Play Music collection into this weird “Uploads” section that hasn’t been fully integrated with “YT Music,” but I can probably work around that. And look, the new custom mixes made just for me are nice to have, as is the almost-fully-black theme.

Alright, your turn – what are you liking and/or disliking about YouTube Music?