Users report iTunes Radio popping up in Australia, UK, and Canada [u]

Posted:
in iPod + iTunes + AppleTV edited February 2014
Over the past few days, Apple's iTunes Radio feature has been showing up on iOS devices in Australia, Canada and the UK despite being officially limited to U.S. users, suggesting an international rollout of the service may be coming soon.

Update: Reader Phil from the UK sent in a few screenshots of iTunes Radio as seen on his iPhone connected to O2's 3G network. In addition, we are receiving reports of sporadic availability in Australia. The following article has been updated to reflect this new information.

iTunes Radio
Screenshot of iTunes Radio taken off a UK iPhone operating on O2's wireless network.


A number of AppleInsider readers in Australia, Canada and the UK have noted that iTunes Radio is now showing up in the Music App on both iPhones and iPads.

According to reports from Canadian users, the iTunes Radio pane is accessible but not usable. Graphical assets may be scrolled through and will pull up relevant artist or song information if tapped, but streaming is so far unavailable. One user from Australia saw the service appear briefly earlier this week, but it has since disappeared.

In the UK, iPhone and iPad owners are seeing a bit more luck and note iTunes Radio is active and streaming in the region. Graphical assets are non-functional in some cases, but the service is streaming music over cellular data networks.

First announced in June of 2013 as a cross-platform Internet streaming radio service, iTunes Radio was launched in September and has seen moderate success in the sector dominated by the likes of Pandora and Rdio. At the end of October, Apple announced iTunes Radio served over one billion songs to customers in the U.S.

iTunes Radio
Screenshot of iTunes Radio on iPad as currently seen in Canada.


While Apple has yet to give official word of an expansion, Bloomberg last year reported that Apple was looking to expand the service to Australia, Canada, the UK and New Zealand in "early 2014."

It should be noted that international users saw intermittent iTunes Radio accessibility late last year without the service coming fully online.
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 22
    MacProMacPro Posts: 19,718member
    I just emailed all my friends and family in UK with this good news. My wife and I love iTunes radio.
  • Reply 2 of 22
    You know, you need only a US iTunes account to be able to access iTunes Radio from anywhere in the world. The service doesn't have to be officially launched in your own country for you to be able to access it.
  • Reply 3 of 22
    paxmanpaxman Posts: 4,729member
    nikmanshah wrote: »
    You know, you need only a US iTunes account to be able to access iTunes Radio from anywhere in the world. The service doesn't have to be officially launched in your own country for you to be able to access it.
    No, but you have to live with the ads and limited 'skips' which you won't when iTunes Radio comes to your country and you have an iTunes Match subscription. Personally I do as you suggest but as implied by the very word, a 'workaround' is a pain in the a.
  • Reply 4 of 22
    While Apple has yet to give official word of an expansion, <em>Bloomberg</em> last year reported that Apple was <a href="http://appleinsider.com/articles/13/10/07/itunes-radio-set-for-uk-canada-australia-rollouts-">looking to expand</a> the service to Australia, Canada, the UK and New Zealand in "early 2014."

    Wow! That's the whole civilized world!!!

    /s
  • Reply 5 of 22
    Ye
    nikmanshah wrote: »
    You know, you need only a US iTunes account to be able to access iTunes Radio from anywhere in the world. The service doesn't have to be officially launched in your own country for you to be able to access it.

    Yeah it's pretty good. Works over 3G too.
  • Reply 6 of 22
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by paxman View Post





    No, but you have to live with the ads and limited 'skips' which you won't when iTunes Radio comes to your country and you have an iTunes Match subscription. Personally I do as you suggest but as implied by the very word, a 'workaround' is a pain in the a.

    Surprisingly mine on my iPhone doesn't have any ads at all, apart from some "by iTunes Radio" self promotions put in by Apple. None of the Nissan, McD, etc. ads show up on my iPhone. Those ads only show up when I play iTunes Radio on my Apple TV and on my MacBook's iTunes.

     

    As for workarounds, not so much. I just have to ensure I logon to my US iTunes account on my iPhone when I want to listen to iTunes Radio, and it works flawlessly. Even works on 3G and LTE cellular connections. No high tech workarounds needed.

  • Reply 7 of 22
    There is a jailbreak app to skip songs.
  • Reply 8 of 22
    asciiascii Posts: 5,936member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Macky the Macky View Post





    Wow! That's the whole civilized world!!!



    /s

    The reason the British Empire always gets products shortly after the United States is not because Apple thinks the rest of the world is uncivilised, it's because those countries are very capitalist, so have fewer legal hoops for Apple to jump through to deploy a new product. Canada and Australia in particular have Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) with the United States.

  • Reply 9 of 22
    saareksaarek Posts: 1,520member
    Not showing on any of our 5 iPhones/iPads alas.
  • Reply 10 of 22
    Not sure about iTunes radio but Absolute Radio UK is suddenly "not available in your country" when there was no problem getting it only a month or two back here in Australia. Has Apple bought them out, sued them or was it just that the Poms lost the Ashes that has made them switch off what was my favourite online radio stream ?
  • Reply 11 of 22
    clemynxclemynx Posts: 1,552member
    Same thing in France. I saw it yesterday but didn't read and realize that it was that, but I just checked and saw the iTunes Radio screen, before it disappeared after a second.
  • Reply 12 of 22
    hill60hill60 Posts: 6,992member

    Nothing here on my Australian iPhones and iPads, yet.

  • Reply 13 of 22

    Does anyone know of a way to get it to work on the Mac? I don't even get an option for it, just "internet" radio.

  • Reply 14 of 22
    There is a jailbreak app to skip songs.

    WOW!!! I've always had to tap the "go forward" Right arrow key! Now, do I leave the iRadio, flip through my pages of apps, open the new app, tell it to skip the song, leavewe that app, so I can return to the iRadio to see the album art of the new song?
  • Reply 15 of 22
    Does anyone know of a way to get it to work on the Mac? I don't even get an option for it, just "internet" radio.

    You have be running "Mavricks" OS.
  • Reply 16 of 22
    zimpimpim wrote: »
    Not sure about iTunes radio but Absolute Radio UK is suddenly "not available in your country" when there was no problem getting it only a month or two back here in Australia. Has Apple bought them out, sued them or was it just that the Poms lost the Ashes that has made them switch off what was my favourite online radio stream ?

    I don't think Apple had anything to do with your fav station going away. The music companies may have had a beef about them broadcasting outside of a specific area.
  • Reply 17 of 22
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Macky the Macky View Post





    You have be running "Mavricks" OS.

    I have been since the day it came out. And my iTunes is up to date. I imagine it has something to do with my not residing in the US. I figured now that people are seeing iTunes Radio on iOS devices, the button to select it in the OSX iTunes might finally appear outside the US, but from what I can see, it's still not there.

  • Reply 18 of 22
    I hope the service is not turned on in Australia. Because if iTunes Radio is playing "Men at Work" under genre of Alternative music and not 80s music they might get a fit and say that their iPhone is giving wrong direction (Ahem! wrong information)
  • Reply 19 of 22
    Nothing on IPhone, iPad or ATV here on my UK itunes Acc.
  • Reply 20 of 22
    The easiest way to get it is to signup for a US iTunes account. You don't have to tie a credit card to it. Just make sure you are signed out out from your current iTunes account, then go to any free app within iTunes, click to download it, then you will be prompted to either sign in to your iTunes account, or sign up for a new account. Click signup for a new account, go thru the usual signup process, but when it comes to billing details, make sure you choose NONE. Then use any valid US postal address as your billing address (a Google maps search for any US address - Starbucks for instance - would be an easy search to do).

    Note that this signup process must absolutely be followed. If you tried to just simply create a new account without trying to download a free app, Apple will force you to use a US credit card, as there won't be any "NONE" option for billing details available.

    Once that's done, now you have a US iTunes account to be used for iTunes Radio or for buying any US specific apps, iBooks, music, TV shows, movies, etc. See, easy enough and no jailbreaks needed even.
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