This hidden iOS 16 feature made my iPhone a music lover’s dream

iOS 16 blew us away with super-useful features like editing and unsending messages, extracting text from videos, and passkeys to say a warm goodbye to passwords. Of course, the ability to finally customize the iPhone lock screen has driven most users crazy.

But one feature that was flying under the radar was music recognition. More specifically, you can now easily find all the songs you’ve identified using your iPhone in one place, with playlists routed directly to Apple Music as an added bonus. .

Hidden music discovery feature in iOS 16

You might think this only works with Shazam, everyone’s favorite app for listening to and identifying songs. But this is good for people running iOS 16 on their iPhones.

Even if you like Apple’s voice assistant saying “Hey Siri, what’s that song?” Once you run the command, your music recognition history won’t disappear in the dark corners of the app.

It’s neatly cataloged in one place whenever you tell your phone to identify the songs playing around you via the Shazam app, Siri, or the dedicated music recognition tool in Control Center. becauseThe location is in the Shazam app[マイ ミュージック]section.

If you’re too lazy to open the Shazam app, there’s a shortcut for that too. Simply pull down Control Center, press and hold the music recognition button with the Shazam icon, and you’ll be presented with a list of all songs discovered using your iPhone’s microphone as the ultimate music discovery tool.

Wouldn’t it be nice to see the entire list without unlocking your phone? If the whole long press gesture seems too much work, there’s an easier way.

Just add the Shazam widget to your iPhone or iPad home screen. You can place it as a stack on top of another widget, or add a standalone Shazam widget to your home screen.

The Shazam widget comes in three sizes. The smallest square widget shows recently identified songs, while the medium-sized rectangular widget shows his last three tracks.

If you want to go jumbo, the biggest Shazam widget lets you see your 4 most recently found songs at a glance. Just tap any track in the Shazam widget and Apple Music does the rest.

In fact, the Shazam app automatically creates a “My Shazam Tracks” playlist in Apple Music, making audio discovery even easier.

iCloud binds everything

After identifying a song using Shazam, they often resorted to taking a screenshot of the song. But the best thing about iOS 16’s new Music Recognition History feature is the ability to sync with iCloud.

Even if you change or lose your phone, your Shazam history won’t go away as long as you remember your Apple ID credentials. Plus, your music recognition history is automatically synced to all other Apple devices you own, as long as you use the same Apple account.

So when you search for songs using Siri or Shazam on your Apple Watch, your music search history will be available in the Shazam app on your iPhone, iPad, and Mac. All thanks to the sync system introduced in iOS. 16.

How to promote music discovery on iPhone

The first move to turn your iPhone into the ultimate music discovery machine is to keep Shazam handy. To do that, place his Shazam button in Control Center so you can quickly access it by simply swiping down on your home or lock screen.

Here’s how: Settings > Control Center > Music Recognition.

Additionally, if you want to access your Shazam-powered discoveries on all your Apple devices, make sure iCloud sync is enabled for your Shazam duties. To do this, open the Settings app, tap your name at the top, and go to your Apple ID page. Once there, follow these steps: iCloud > View All > Music Recognition.

Plus, if you want to keep your Shazam finds neatly organized in your music streaming app’s own hub, it shouldn’t be too much of a hassle. in the Shazam app[マイ ミュージック]Simply open a section and tap one of the tracks to play.

Then you’ll see a red round Apple Music button below the song player bar. Tap it to add the song to a dedicated Shazams playlist in your Apple Music library.

My playlists are mostly game soundtracks like Mick Gordon, so I’m not a music purist. Doom and Bear McCreary God of War. But if pop beats sound random, Shazam helps me refresh my musical palette.

Combined with iOS’s brilliant integration of Shazam and Siri music recognition, iCloud syncing and easy library creation, my iPhone is the most powerful and balanced music gadget I’ve ever used.

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