Buy Music on Android
If you want to purchase some music to play on your Android device, you have several options. You can use Google's Play Store to purchase tracks using your Google Wallet. If you have an Amazon account, you can use the Amazon Music app to browse for and purchase songs. You can also pick from a variety streaming services.
Contents
Steps
Google Play Music
- Update your Play Store. The Google Play Store app allows you to purchase music to play on your Android device. In order to access the music, you'll need to ensure that you have the latest version of the Play Store available. Note that very old Android devices may not be able to update to the latest versions of the Play Store.
- Open the Store on your Android device.
- Open the menu and tap "My Apps".
- Tap the "Update All" button to install any available updates. You may want to connect to a wireless network to save on data costs.
- Download the Google Play Music app. You'll need this app in order to listen to music that you've purchased from the Google Play Store. Many newer Android devices come with Google Play Music installed automatically. Very old devices may not support the app.
- Open the Play Store and search for "Google Music" to download the app.
- Google Music may not be available in all regions.
- Add a payment method to your Google Account. In order to purchase any songs from the Google Play Store, you'll need a Google Wallet account and a valid payment method.
- Open the Google Play Store menu and select "My account".
- Tap "Add payment method" or "More payment settings".
- Sign into your Google Wallet. If you don't have a Google Wallet associated with your Google account, you'll be taken through the steps to create one.
- Enter in your payment method. Besides credit or debit cards, you may have additional options depending on your location, including PayPal, carrier billing, and gift cards.
- Open the Music section of the Play Store. Updated versions of the Play Store will have a Music section that you can access from the main page of the Play Store.
- Swipe left and right to open the different sections. When you first open the Music section, you'll be taken to the Music Home screen. This will display recommendations based on past purchases as well as current specials and popular albums.
- The Genres section will allow you to browse the library by musical genre. When you select a Genre, you'll still see the following sections but for that genre only. You can open the Genre menu again to select sub-genres.
- The Top Albums section will list the current chart-topping album releases.
- The New Releases section will list of notable new albums.
- The Top Songs section will list the most popular songs in the library.
- Search for a specific artist, album, or song using the magnifying glass. If you know what you want, you can search the store for it using the magnifying glass.
- Select an album, artist, or song to view more details. When you select something in the Google Play Store, you can see more information and links. Selecting an artist will show a brief bio, a list of popular songs, available discography, and similar artists. Selecting an album will show liner notes, track list, and reviews. Selecting a song will display the rest of the album tracks.
- Purchase an item. You can buy either whole albums or individual songs. Tap the price to begin the purchase process.
- Select your payment method. After choosing to purchase something, the purchase window will appear. Your default payment option will be displayed, along with the price. Tap the price to choose a different payment method associated with your Google Wallet account. Tap "Buy" to confirm the purchase.
- Your payment method will be charged immediately.
- Depending on your account settings, you may be prompted to enter your Google account password.
- Open the Google Play Music app to find your songs. All of your purchased music will be immediately available in the Google Play Music app. Newly-added songs and albums can be found in the "Recent activity" section of the Listen Now page. You can also see all of your purchases in the My Library page.
- Set songs to be available offline. All of your purchases are immediately available for streaming, but you can also download them to your device so that you can listen when you're offline.
- Open the album or playlist that you want to save to your device.
- Tap the Download button at the top of the list of songs. This will begin downloading the songs to your device. These downloaded songs will only play in the Google Play Music app.
- Consider the Google Play Music All Access (GPMAA) service. If you purchase a lot of music, you may want to consider subscribing to the GPMAA service. This is a paid service that gives you unlimited access to any song in the Play Music library. You can add any song or album that you find to your GPMAA library so that you can listen to it any time.
- You can start a free trial by opening the Play Music menu and selecting "Start Trial".
- Google Play Music All Access is not available in all regions.
Amazon MP3
- Download the Amazon Music app. You can download it for free from the Google Play Store.
- You can purchase MP3s from the Amazon website as well, but the app is an easier interface for mobile devices.
- Sign into the app with your Amazon account. If you don't have an account, you can create one from within the app. You'll need an account with a payment method or gift card balance in order to purchase songs from the app.
- For more details on creating an Amazon account, Make-an-Amazon-Account.
- Browse the Music Store. You'll be taken to the Music Store home screen when you log into the app for the first time. Here you can find some of the top charts. Tap any of the "See all" links to view the whole list.
- Search the store using the magnifying glass. You can search for artists, albums, or individual songs.
- Tap and album or song to view more details. When you select an album, you'll be shown a list of all of the tracks, as well as the price for the whole album and each track's price. You can also preview the album by tapping the "Sample this Album" button. This will begin playing the first thirty seconds of each song on the album.
- You can also tap the icon for a song to begin playing the sample.
- Samples are not available for all songs.
- Purchase a song or album by tapping the price. You will be asked to confirm that you want to purchase the music. Your default payment method will be charged as soon as you confirm.
- For your first purchase, you may be asked to accept the terms of service.
- Not all songs are available for purchase. Sometimes certain songs are only available if your purchase the entire album.
- Find your purchases. Tap the ☰ button to open the menu and select "Recent Activity". Tap the "Purchased" tab to find your newly-purchased music.
- You can also browse through all of the music in your library by opening the menu and selecting "Your Library".
- Download songs to your device. You can stream any of your purchased music from the cloud, but you can also download it to your device so that you can listen without being connected to the internet.
- Tap the menu button (⋮) next to the album or song you want to download.
- Select "Download". The song(s) will begin downloading to your device.
- Find your downloaded MP3s (optional). When you download music from Amazon to your device, you can actually find the MP3 files if you use a file manager app or connect your Android device to your computer. This can be useful if you want to copy some music to your computer for backup, or want to share a song with a friend.
- You can find the Music folder on your Android device. Songs downloaded from Amazon will have artist folders with album folders inside.
Streaming Services
- Consider a streaming service. There are other options to legally listen to music on your Android device without purchasing it. Streaming services such as Pandora and Spotify allow you to listen to music without purchasing individual songs or albums. Both have free versions that allow you to stream with ads, as well as paid versions that remove the ads and add more functionality.
- Google Play Music has the All Access service as well, but this does not have a free version.
- Download the app of your choice. The apps for all of the streaming services are available from the Google Play Store.
- Sign up for an account. You'll need to create an account before you can begin using these apps, even if you are using the free version. The process varies depending on the service.
- Start streaming music. Once you're logged in, you can start streaming music whenever you'd like. You'll need a network connection in order to connect to the streaming servers. The different streaming services all offer different features and ways to listen to music.
- Use-Spotify-on-an-Android.
- Use-Pandora-on-Android.
- Use-Slacker-Radio-on-Android.
