Free music streaming

Before you consider streaming, a word of warning: ensure your broadband and mobile data connection have a generous data download limit. While you're not actually downloading a track to keep, streaming will use up your monthly allowance. Otherwise you risk being hit with added costs.

As a general rule:

You need a high (or unlimited) download limit, or you could be slapped with gargantuan charges.

For example, if you're going to listen to about six hours of music per week, and that's all you'll be doing, you'll need a monthly download allowance of at least 5GB.

If you're going to be streaming more music, or doing other data-heavy things, like streaming movies, it's worth checking that your broadband package offers unlimited usage (most do these days), so you'll not have the worry of exceeding any limit – for all our broadband need-to-knows, see How to find cheap broadband deals.

If you're streaming on a smartphone or tablet, use Wi-Fi whenever possible or switch to a deal that offers you more data if you want to listen on the go to avoid extra charges – see Best Sim-only deals for more info.

There are plenty of online music-streaming services that are legal, though thousands more aren't. The Government and internet providers are cracking down on the illegal ones, while some services only work in certain countries due to music licensing restrictions.

All those included below are legal, and will work in the UK.

Spotify offers an array of extra features to both free and Premium users, such as being able to follow what friends are listening to and find music already on your computer, phone or tablet and add it to your Spotify library, so you can listen to it on other devices just by logging in to your account.

Spotify automatically generates daily and weekly personalised mixes and playlists based on the artists you follow and tracks you listen to most. This feature is available to free users as well as subscribers.

• There's a free two-month trial available for Premium newbies – you'll be charged £11.99 a month automatically at the end unless you cancel.

• Alternatively, you can get a free three-month trial if you go via PayPal, but you'll need a PayPal account to do this.

• The Premium Family for sharing with up to six others (each with their own profile) costs £19.99 a month.

• The Premium Student costs £5.99 a month (first month free for new subscribers).

• Works on PCs, Macs, Android devices and iOS devices, some smart TVs and TV streaming devices, some game systems, smart speakers, and some car dashboard systems. For more info, see the Spotify supported devices page.

Upgrading to Amazon Music Unlimited will let you listen without ads and shuffle-only, plus gives you unlimited skips and lets you download tracks for listening offline.

• You don't need to have Amazon Prime to use Amazon Music Free.

Upgrading to Deezer Premium will let you listen without ads and shuffle-only, plus gives you unlimited skips and lets you download tracks for listening offline.

The 'Flow' feature mixes your favourite tracks with new recommendations and old favourites based on your listening habits, creating an "infinite stream" of personalised music.

• There's also a free one-month trial available for Premium newbies – you'll be charged £11.99a month automatically at the end unless you cancel. You can also sign up for a year for £107.91 (equivalent to £8.99 a month). 

• Deezer Family (£19.99 a month or £218.99 a year, first month free) lets up to six people access an account at once.

• Deezer Student provides those enrolled at a college or university Premium access for £5.99 a month (first month free).

• There is an app for both PC and Mac as well as iOS devicesandAndroid devices. It can also be used with various web browsers, selected smart TVs and smart speakers, smart watches and more. For a full list of devices, see Deezer support.

Because of its focus on artists and getting new material published, SoundCloud is ideal for discovering new or smaller artists that you may not find elsewhere, and exploring trending music.

Since it introduced a paid option back in 2016, the free version has ads and you must pay to listen offline. SoundCloud Go costs £5.99 a month and removes the ads and lets you listen offline, while SoundCloud Go+ (£10.99 a month) gives you that plus access to every track and better quality sound.

• Free seven-day trial available for SoundCloud Go newbies – you'll be charged £5.99 a month automatically at the end unless you cancel.

• Free 30-day trial for SoundCloud Go+ newbies - you'll be charged £10.99 a month automatically at the end unless you cancel.

• Students can get Soundcloud Go+ for £5.49 a month (after a free 30-day trial).

• SoundCloud Artist Pro, more for musicians, costs £6.25 a month (or £75 a year) and gives you unlimited track uploads and advanced stats on your tracks.

• There are apps for Android devices and iOS devices, Windows computers and tablets and Xbox One. You can also use it via your web browser.

If you just want instant access to music, Jango is a good starting point. It enables you to 'like' or 'ban' songs so they are played more often or not all, and to customise stations, even without registering (although you'll have to if you want to save your stations and preferences). You can also skip an unlimited number of songs, which is rare for a free platform.

The site also provides emerging artists with the opportunity to showcase their music by playing their songs alongside those of similar popular artists.

Jango is free because it's funded by ads, so if you use the service without creating an account, you'll hear an audio ad every so often, though it says it tries to keep these to a minimum. To hear fewer ads, create a Jango account and connect it with  your Facebook account and you'll only get one audio ad per day. At present the mobile apps are ad-free.

• No paid-for version – it's always free.

• It'll work through most browsers, and there are apps for both Android devices and iOS devices – they have good reviews and are ad-free. 

Spotify offers an array of extra features to both free and Premium users, such as being able to follow what friends are listening to and find music already on your computer, phone or tablet and add it to your Spotify library, so you can listen to it on other devices just by logging in to your account.

Spotify automatically generates daily and weekly personalised mixes and playlists based on the artists you follow and tracks you listen to most. This feature is available to free users as well as subscribers.

• There's a free two-month trial available for Premium newbies at the time of writing – you'll be charged £11.99 a month automatically at the end unless you cancel.

• Spotify no longer allows new subscribers to make payments for Premium via Apple's in-app purchase system (iAP) – you now have to subscribe direct via debit card, credit card or PayPal.

• The Premium Family plan for sharing with up to six others (each with their own profile) costs £19.99 a month.

• The Premium Student plan costs £5.99 a month (first month free for new subscribers).

• Works on PCs, Macs, iOS devices and Android devices devices, some smart TVs and TV streaming devices, some game systems, smart speakers, and some car dashboard systems. For more info, see Spotify supported devices.

• Share with the family and it works out even less per person. The family plan* gives access to up to six household members, each with their own account. It's £19.99 a month and obviously the more of you there are, the better the value – it would be equivalent to £10 a month each if there are two of you or £3.34 a month with six. But be warned – only one person pays, so you'll be left to collect money from your family or friends unless you're paying for everyone.

• Check if you need Unlimited. If you already subscribe to Amazon Prime, Amazon Music Prime* is available as part of your £8.99 a month or £95 a year subscription. There are over 100 million songs (same as Unlimited but lower audio quality), as well as podcasts, but you can't listen offline or skip as many songs as you'd like. Think of it as similar to 'free' versions of other apps, except you pay for Prime membership.

Remember, unless you cancel before your free Amazon Music Unlimited trial is up, you'll be automatically charged to renew. For full help if you forget to cancel, see Reclaim unwanted Amazon Prime.

One nice extra feature of Amazon Music Unlimited is its integration with Echo home speakers. By speaking to it you can request songs by lyrics, year of release or mood. As with other premium music-streaming services, the more you use it, the more personalised your recommendations will be.

Here's a summary of the pricing:

• You'll automatically be charged at the end of the free trial unless you cancel your subscription.

• The family plan* lets up to six listen simultaneously for £19.99 a month (first 30 days free for new subscribers).

• The student plan* lets eligible students listen for £5.99 a month (first 30 days free).

• There's a £5.99 a month plan (first 30 days free for new subscribers) for use via Amazon Echo and Fire TV devices – but not any other devices. To get Alexa for less, see our Amazon Echo hacks.

• Prime membership gives one-day delivery on many items, film and TV streaming via Prime Video and a few other benefits.

• There's an Amazon Music app* for Android devices, iOS devices and Amazon's own Fire tablet and Fire TV devices, as well as for PCs and Macs.

The most-touted feature of Apple Music is its live and on-demand radio station Apple Music 1, with shows hosted by DJ Zane Lowe and a range of well-known artists such as Nile Rodgers, Elton John and Alanis Morissette.

As you'd expect from a paid-for service, you can listen ad-free online and offline and use the service across your compatible devices. Also, any music you've bought in the iTunes store will be synced to Apple Music so it's available to stream on all your devices.

If you don't take the trial and/or pay to subscribe, you can still listen to Apple Music 1 for free, but this is a very limited option – you can't listen to songs on demand or skip tracks – which is why it didn't make it into our top free music streaming services.

• The paid subscription automatically begins when the free trial ends, so cancel before the trial period is up if you don't want to pay £10.99 a month.

• The Family subscription lets up to six listen for £16.99 a month.

• The Student subscription costs £5.99 a month.

• You can pay for Apple Music using Apple gift cards, which can often be found discounted (check these are UK vouchers – overseas vouchers can't be redeemed in the UK).

• Works on Macs and PCS with iTunes, iOS devices running iOS 10.0 or later and Android devices.

The feature that most sets YouTube Music apart from its competitors is that enables you to store up to 100,000 tracks you already own in the cloud, for listening to (or downloading) anywhere you've got an internet connection. This makes it ideal for those who already have a significant collection of songs.

Interestingly, this feature is available to non-paying users as well as Premium subscribers, so by all means use it for this function alone if you want to back up your songs and listen to them online without paying a penny.

• You'll be charged at the end of the free trial unless you cancel.

• The family plan lets up to five family members aged 13+ listen for £16.99 a month (first month free for new subscribers).

• The student plan costs £5.49 a month (first month free for new subscribers).

• You can listen via desktop and laptop computer, and on Android devices and iOS devices.