Amazon preparing standalone streaming music service to compete with Spotify, Apple Music

Amazon is still finalizing content licenses for the service, which is anticipated to cost $9.99 per month like Spotify or Apple Music, Reuters sources said. A launch is expected in late summer or early fall.

Although Amazon already offers on-demand streaming via Prime Music, that service has small catalog of somewhere over a million songs — in comparison, its rivals have about 30 times that amount. A Prime subscription is also $10.99 per month, unless people make a year-long commitment for $99. Both tiers do come with extra benefits like streaming video and free two-day shipping on Amazon products.

Amazon is said to be interested in growing the popularity of the Echo, which has been a major hit and doubles as both a virtual assistant and a speaker. While it already supports a variety of music services — like Pandora, Spotify, TuneIn, and of course Prime Music — a full-scale, closely-integrated Amazon music service could boost the product further.

In theory the new service could take a route similar as Prime Video, which recently became available in a scaled-back Prime tier costing $8.99 per month.

Next week Apple is expected to revamp Apple Music by improving its interface and expanding Beats radio. Reports have hinted that the company is developing its own Echo-like device, though the product is unlikely to see public release in the near future.