Apple has pushed out the latest software update for iPhones, iOS 26.4. No, that doesn\u2019t sound like an inspiring first sentence for a big music story, but the update is accompanied by some significant additions to Apple Music.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
One of them was leaked earlier this year but is now official: \u2018Playlist Playground\u2019. It\u2019s Apple Music\u2019s take on prompt-generated playlists, powered by its Apple Intelligence tech.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Listeners describe the playlist they want to create using natural language, and can then adjust \u201celements such as mood or energy\u201d while creating their own artwork, then save the results to their library and share it with others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
For now, the new feature is only available in the US for Apple Music subscribers with English set as their preferred language, although from launch it\u2019ll work on the service\u2019s Android app as well as iPhone and iPad.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u2018Playlist Playground\u2019 marks Apple Music\u2019s arrival at the prompt-personalisation party. Spotify has been\u00a0rolling its \u2018Prompted Playlist\u2019 feature out globally<\/a>; YouTube Music\u00a0recently debuted its own \u2018AI Playlist\u2019 feature<\/a>; and\u00a0Amazon Musi<\/a>c and\u00a0Deezer<\/a>\u00a0showed off their own tests in 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What else is new for Apple Music this week? Two new ticketing-focused partnerships: with Ticketmaster and Bandsintown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n The former deal<\/a>\u00a0is powering the service\u2019s new \u2018Concert Discovery\u2019 feature, showing concert listings within the Apple Music app \u2013\u00a0both on its homepage, on artist profiles and in a dedicated \u2018Concerts\u2019 tab.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Meanwhile,\u00a0the Bandsintown integration<\/a>\u00a0will ensure that artists\u2019 listings appear on their profiles and within the new tab too. Artists can set it up by toggling the \u2018Apple Music\u2019 option in Bandsintown\u2019s \u2018Integrations\u2019 menu.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In both cases, the partnerships also tie in to ticketing features elsewhere in Apple\u2019s family of apps: Shazam, Apple Maps and Photos as well as its \u2018Spotlight\u2019 search function.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n Spotify recently said that it has\u00a0driven more than $1.5bn in ticket sales<\/a>\u00a0from its concert discovery features, up from $1bn by the first half of 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That\u2019s evidence that these features can help to fill venues, so Apple Music\u2019s expansion of its own ticketing integrations is good news for artists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For all the DSPs, these expansions also set up possible future developments if and when they launch so-called \u2018supremium\u2019 tiers: more-expensive monthly subscriptions that add features and benefits for their users.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Early last year, Live Nation boss Michael Rapino said that his company had been in talks with \u201cSpotify and Apple and Amazon\u201d about potentially making inventory available in pre-sales to those supremium subscribers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe\u2019ve been working with all three of them trying to find a model that may work for us and them, and I assume that they\u2019re talking to others also,\u201d\u00a0he told analysts at the time<\/a>.<\/p>\n