This review was updated in July 2011.
What is eMusic?
eMusic is an online music service.
They have a huge library with over 10'000'000 music MP3s – free from copy protection – in every genre. Additionally there are also audio books available.
eMusic is my favorite source for Swing and Jazz music, I'm downloading all kind of music, though.
For a long time it was unavailable for different European countries, meanwhile they have opened up eMusic Europe and eMusic UK.
How does eMusic work?
- Start your free trial: You sign up and get a free credit of $10 / €10 / £ 10.50 and you can download up to 25 music tracks within 7 days. Afterwards you'll pay monthly.
- You download the eMusic download manager
- You download your MP3 songs and they will automatically be synchronized with your preferred media player as iTunes, Windows Media Player and Winamp. (If there is a problem with the download, you can download them again)
- Listen your songs with any MP3 player or media player including the iPod and Creative Zen.
- You can cancel your subscription at any time, 24 hours a day online, and there is no cancellation fee
eMusic Europe price plans
eMusic Lite
payment: € 6,49 (every 30 days) = download credit: € 6,49
eMusic Basic
payment: € 11,99 (every 30 days) = download credit: € 11,99
eMusic Plus
payment: € 15,99 (every 30 days) plus bonus € 1,00 = download credit € 16,99
eMusic Premium
payment: € 20,99 (every 30 days) plus bonus € 2,00 = download credit € 22,99
eMusic Fan
payment: € 31,99 (every 30 days) plus bonus € 4,00 = download credit € 35,99
eMusic Enthusiast
payment: € 41,99 (every 30 days) plus bonus € 6,00 = download credit € 47,99
eMusic Connoisseur
payment: € 79.99 (every 30 days) plus bonus € 15,00 = download credit € 94,99
Also available:
Quaterly, bi-annual and annual price plans .
Who is eMusic for?
If you are regularly downloading music online and if you also love independent and alternative music then eMusic is the right choice for you.
If you rarely download music online and if you are only looking for music from major labels, then the service might not make sense to you. Although, eMusic is adding music from major labels all the time.
What I like about eMusic
Altough the prices are higher than in the US store, eMusic Europe is cheaper than other services: a single song is usually credited for € 0,49!
In comparison: Amazon's price range starts at € 0,68, but most songs cost between € 0,77 and € 0,98 per song.
The catalogue is really huge. And the great thing is, you find a lot of albums which are sold out as cds. When you are lucky you will find these cds somewhere second hand, but often pretty expensive.
Downsides
There is no roll-over of unused credits. You have to use your credit within 30 days, otherwise you will lose it.
You don't know what you get quality-wise. They don't share the bitrates of the songs, so often you get them with bad sound quality…
![\\\\\\\"Clicky\\\\\\\"](\\\\\\\"//in.getclicky.com/66446878ns.gif\\\\\\\")