Apple has claimed its Beats 1 streaming radio station on Apple Music is the biggest radio station in the world.
In an interview with The Verge, Apple Music executives said that new and exclusive content released by musicians was driving bigger numbers than ever for Beats 1 and Apple Music.
“There’s no way you’re going to find another station that has as many concurrent listeners and audience-wise as Beats 1, period,” said Apple Music head of content Larry Jackson. Apple did not disclose specific data to support its claims.
Songs and albums released by Canadian musician Drake on his Beats 1 radio show were bringing in “TV numbers” according to Apple’s Jimmy Iovine, who said that collaborating directly with musicians was a key part of how Apple Music tries to distinguish itself from competitors like Spotify.
“We’re always searching for ideas and new ways to do things. These [streaming] services cannot be utilities, it’s not enough. They have to be – they almost have to make music a verb – it has to just move. And that’s what we’re trying to do,” said Jimmy Iovine.
Last week, Drake’s latest album was streamed 89.9 million times on Apple Music during the first 24 hours of release, a new record for all music streaming services. The figure was significantly ahead of the 61.3 million streams on Spotify, which has five times more users than Apple Music’s 20 million.
