Beats Music has entered the crowded music-streaming space less than two months ago and already the startup is making moves with the aim of becoming a music platform of sorts.
Akin to Rdio, Spotify and other subscription-based music services, Beats Music offers unlimited streaming for ten bucks a month through the web and via their awesome iPhone app.
CNET is now reporting that the company has now officially opened up its application programming interface (API) to all third-part developers as it seeks to foster the creation of mobile apps with Beats Music integration…
They’ve been testing the API privately with select developers, resulting in Beats Music integrations with the Sonos wireless speakers and the Bop.fm aggregator of music services.
Beats Music CEO Ian C. Rogers said:
If you’re willing to pay $100 a year for music, which in my experience for all the world’s music is a tremendous bargain, you should have access to music anywhere you might want it, in your car, house, anywhere.
According to the API page, developers can use Beats Music in their apps to retrieve metadata on any artist, album or song from the service’s catalog of twenty million tracks, as well as stream songs in high-quality 320kbps audio resolution, access playlists, recommendations and the curated content from its editorial team and more.
“We know we have a great API, because our coders use it every day,” the CEO said.
“This isn’t just about giving access to the catalog of music,” said Rogers. “This is about people who are subscribers to a premium music service that has premium music features, as a subscriber you should have access anywhere.”
It’s interesting that Beats Music is one of the music services supported by Apple’s CarPlay, an iOS-based in-car infotainment system announced earlier this week at the Geneva Motor Show. In addition to Beats Music, CarPlay also supports Spotify, Pandora, iHeart Radio, Stitcher and Podcasts apps.
Support for other third-party apps is coming soon.
Beats Music is available free in the App Store.
The iPhone and iPod touch client requires iOS 6.0 or later.
The service is currently a U.S.-only affair.