Rumor: Amazon to launch a cheap Echo-exclusive music service

Amazon has been in the digital music game for a while now, what with its library of MP3 downloads and Prime Music streaming service. According to Recode, the company isn’t done there though, Amazon also wants to offer a cheap music subscription service that costs just $4 or $5 per month. The catch is that it will apparently only work with the company’s Echo speaker.

Industry sources seem to believe that Amazon wants to launch this new service sometime in September. However, unlike most streaming services it apparently won’t work on phones or tablets, just Amazon’s Echo player. The little internet connected speaker that is powered by Alexa launched late last year and has already sold over one million units. The company hopes to sell 3 million this year and 10 million in 2017.

At $5 per month, Amazon’s Echo service would undercut the majority of other all-you-can-listen buffets out there, including Spotify, Google Play Music, and Apple Music. The currently typical monthly rate for an individual music subscription is $10 per month. Unlike cheaper radio services, such as Pandora which doesn’t allow users to play any track on-demand, Amazon would offer up unlimited ad-free music on-demand for this price.

Such a move wouldn’t be a first for Amazon. Earlier in the year the company separated its video subscription service from Prime, offering it at just $9 per month. Of course, tying the service to its Echo hardware would likely make Amazon’s new music subscription a harder sell. Although the company clearly has some pretty high sales expectations for is speaker system, which might just give the new music platform enough users to make it successful.