Google will pull the plug from Play Music by the end of this year and you will no longer be able to stream music via the service from October. Play Music will be completely replaced by YouTube Music from December. If you don’t want to lose your data, such as songs you have bought, then you should transfer the data to YouTube Music. We explain how that works.
Although you will no longer be able to stream music from October, Play Music will still be available until the end of the year. This allows you to access your playlists, uploads, purchases and favorites until December. After December, this data will disappear, so it is important that you transfer your data to YouTube Music before then. After all, it would be a shame if you lose your purchases or your carefully curated playlists.
That’s how you do that
To transfer data, you must first download the YouTube Music app from the Apple Store or the Google Play Store. In Android 10, Google has already replaced the Play Music app with YouTube Music.
You can in your web browser too this link click and then press Transfer. In the app, tap your profile picture and then tap Settings and Transfer. Tap on Transfer from Google Play Music to transfer your library, data and invoices. If there is no data to be transferred, Google will also indicate this.
Depending on how much music you have in Google Play Music, the transfer can take minutes to several hours (or even days). In the meantime, you can simply close the app and continue using your phone. If you want, you can open the app again in the meantime to see how much data has already been transferred. Eventually you will get a notification and an email when Google has finished transferring the data. Then open the YouTube Music app and find at Library all your music from Play Music back.
Podcasts
If you listen to podcasts in Play Music, you can also transfer subscriptions and episode progress to Google’s new music app. Go to podcasts.google.com/transfer and click on Transfer podcasts. Google also warns on this page that you must transfer your subscriptions and delivery progress for each account separately in case you have more than one account. The same also applies to all other data that you have transferred to YouTube Music.
