Tip: Save Big on Groove Music Pass

Tip: Save Big on Groove Music Pass

Thanks to a new promotion that is tied to the Labor Day holiday here in the United States, you can get 6 months of free access to Groove Music Pass if you pay for just one month.

Well, maybe.

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As you might expect of such an offer, there are all kinds of caveats. These include:

  • You must buy one month of Groove Music Pass, at about $10, to get started.
  • You must be a new subscriber. This offer is not available to anyone who is currently, or ever was in the past, a subscriber.
  • You must live in certain countries. But it’s not U.S.-only, which is a nice change. This offer is valid in the U.S., Canada, United Kingdom, France, Germany, and Mexico.
  • You must act quickly. This offer is valid until 12:00 a.m. Pacific Time (PT) September 5, 2017 (through next Monday).
  • The 6 months of free access comes in the forms of two tokens, each good for three months of Groove Music Pass access, which will arrive within 30 days of purchase and must be redeemed by October 31, 2017.

But there is some good news, too: Those tokens are transferable. So you could take both for yourself, take one and give the other to someone else, or give them both away.

Should you do it?

I don’t feel that Groove Music Pass is as good as any of the top music subscription services—Spotify, Apple Music, and so on—but you can’t beat the price: $10 for 7 months of unlimited music across devices is pretty hard to argue with.

You can learn more here.

 

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Conversation 25 comments

  • Johan Rios

    29 August, 2017 - 12:28 pm

    <p>Hey Paul, With a Groove Music Pass another 100GB of space gets added to your OneDrive 🙂 that's another addition</p>

  • Waethorn

    29 August, 2017 - 12:53 pm

    <p>Does this really matter? When you subscribe to anything, you're locked in for life.</p><p><br></p><p>Let me put it this way: would you think differently if your free months came at the very end of your subscription?</p>

    • George Rae

      29 August, 2017 - 4:18 pm

      <blockquote><em>Who holds the gun to your head? Comments like this never make sense to me. Playing the victim and all.</em><a href="#169548"><em>In reply to Waethorn:</em></a></blockquote><p><br></p>

      • Waethorn

        29 August, 2017 - 4:42 pm

        <blockquote><a href="#169617"><em>In reply to Sectime:</em></a></blockquote><p>What are you going on about? I'm saying that a free period for what would be a perpetual subscription really doesn't matter. It makes no sense mathematically.</p>

    • ozaz

      29 August, 2017 - 8:35 pm

      <blockquote><a href="#169548"><em>In reply to Waethorn:</em></a></blockquote><p><br></p><p>I routinely cycle between music subscription services to take advantage of promotions.</p><p><br></p><p>Unlike things like my email provider and password manager, I don't feel locked into my subscription music services at all.</p>

  • jwpear

    Premium Member
    29 August, 2017 - 1:01 pm

    <p>I have been an Xbox/Groove Music subscriber for at least a few years now and I'm seriously thinking about dropping it when my current year's subscription is up. I find that it just doesn't help me discover new or rediscover old music very well. I have a huge library of music that I own. I've placed it all on OneDrive so it can access it from any device I use. You'd think Groove would be able to mine that and offer up some good suggestions of both new and old music. It constantly gives me crap recommendations of songs and artists that are no where near the styles and genres that I enjoy. I get frustrated with it every time I try a playlist recommendation.</p><p><br></p><p>I can use iTunes, or even Spotify, and very quickly (re)discover music that I enjoy. I don't understand why those are so much better than Groove.</p><p><br></p><p>The only thing holding me back is the cross platform capability, which is available with Spotify, and ability to play my own music from OneDrive.</p><p><br></p><p>Anyone else find recommendations frustrating in Groove?</p>

    • Finley

      Premium Member
      29 August, 2017 - 1:10 pm

      <blockquote><a href="#169555"><em>In reply to jwpear:</em></a></blockquote><p>I feel the same. I think the only reason I haven't switch is that I pay yearly and was content the last time I renewed.</p><p><br></p><p>As far as recommendations I never found that useful but have found the radio function to be helpful in finding new music base on an artist of my choosing.</p>

    • BBoileau

      Premium Member
      29 August, 2017 - 8:00 pm

      <p>I am aligned to you in that I have a collection and have added it to OneDrive. I agree the the suggestions are terrible and the resources for discovery are weak. The only useful feature is the efficient access to my collection in the cloud. I have always paid monthly and in relation to this article, I was frustrated that they continue to offer great deals to new subscribers and nothing for us regulars. </p><p><br></p>

  • PeteB

    29 August, 2017 - 1:14 pm

    <p>No thanks. Subpar to Spotify in every way.</p>

    • SvenJ

      29 August, 2017 - 2:39 pm

      <blockquote><a href="#169566"><em>In reply to PeteB:</em></a> How so? To what service do you upload your collection in Spotify, so you can retrieve music you own on any device, anywhere. I don't know you can't do that, just wondering. </blockquote><p><br></p>

  • Stooks

    29 August, 2017 - 2:00 pm

    <p>"I don’t feel that Groove Music Pass is as good as any of the top music subscription services"</p><p><br></p><p>Why is that? </p><p><br></p><p>For me it is a non starter because of the lack of a family plan. That said in the limited testing I did with it, it was good service. I have no idea about it's music catalog but it had everything I searched for. I would imagine it is pretty much the same 30-40+ million songs as Apple/Google/Amazon/Spotify. </p><p><br></p><p>The iOS app is nice and simple, much like the Amazon music app. Certainly better than Apple or Google's train wreck of music apps.</p>

    • SvenJ

      29 August, 2017 - 2:37 pm

      <blockquote><a href="#169578"><em>In reply to Stooks:</em></a> You mentioned the big one for many. </blockquote><p><br></p>

    • ozaz

      29 August, 2017 - 8:27 pm

      <blockquote><a href="#169578"><em>In reply to Stooks:</em></a></blockquote><p><br></p><p>It's not just about size of the catalogue though. Spotify and Apple Music do a better job than Groove (and Gooogle for that matter) with curated playlists and new music discovery. For many, particularly younger users, this is very important. Spotify (I'm not sure about Apple Music) is also much better at social than Groove and Gooogle Music. Again important for younger users.</p>

  • jjaegers

    29 August, 2017 - 3:27 pm

    <p>No support for Android Auto / Apple Car Play, and no family plan makes Groove a total non-starter.</p><p><br></p><p>Google Music is a great value at $15/month for the family plan… especially when you consider it comes with YouTube Red for the whole family also… by far the best value out there.</p>

  • dnation70

    Premium Member
    29 August, 2017 - 3:40 pm

    <p>why pay for music..it is free on youtube!!!!</p>

  • Wolf

    Premium Member
    29 August, 2017 - 4:53 pm

    <p>Isn't is great how Microsoft rewards and supports its existing customers? This is the second deal in a row where they only offer it to new customers. Not even to returning customers! Thanks for nothing Microsoft. I'm sure sales are skyrocketing. :(</p>

  • gregsedwards

    Premium Member
    29 August, 2017 - 5:30 pm

    <p>Are they getting any closer to offering a family subscription? I might consider this for my son, but not if they're going to turn around an offer a family plan in the next 3 months.</p>

  • thea2_

    Premium Member
    29 August, 2017 - 9:55 pm

    <p>Well again no love for current customers, feels like I'm dealing with AT&amp;T at renewal time. Also when trying to get the soundtrack for Atomic Blonde, Groove only had one track of 22 available due to copy write issues. lame</p>

  • Louis Brauer

    30 August, 2017 - 2:54 am

    <p><span style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); background-color: transparent;">The fact that Microsoft is throwing vouchers for Groove for new customers in certain markets suggests that this service is likely to have received its last change internally before it is shut down (like so many other Microsoft consumer products). </span></p><p><br></p><p><span style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); background-color: transparent;">I have been a Spotify user for many years and have now been trying for several months to use Groove. With the other commentators I have to agree, Groove doesn't help me to discover new songs at all – which is my main reason to use a music streaming service at all. The only good feature is the possibility to add my own music library. It is a pity to see that Microsoft invests its budget in offering the service free of charge instead of advancing it and making it more attractive to users.</span></p><p><br></p><p><span style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); background-color: transparent;">Microsoft, why not use your own AI machine learning offerings you're so heavily promoting to create playlist recommendations that actually match my music taste (which can be easily found out by scanning my library).</span></p><p><br></p><p><span style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); background-color: transparent;">On the other hand, according to some own research, it seems that Groove has some of the highest payout rates for artists compared to Spotify and Apple. Which is a good thing and deserves appreciation.</span></p><p><br></p>

  • bsd107

    Premium Member
    30 August, 2017 - 11:10 am

    <ul><li>"You must be a new subscriber. This offer is not available to anyone who is currently, or ever was in the past, a subscriber."</li></ul><p><br></p><p>Thanks for being clear on this. I read about this offer on another site a month ago, and signed up, but since I was a subscriber up until about two years ago, I never got the codes for the free extra months. Neither that other article or the Groove site was clear on this.</p>

  • Daekar

    31 August, 2017 - 9:56 am

    <p>I really want to drop Google and use Groove, but they make it really hard. No ability to download to SD cards on Android is a deal killer if you're playing music for anything important (we host ballroom/swing dances, gotta be local), and no family plan makes the value proposition poor.</p><p>I don't actually care of their catalogue is just the tiniest bit smaller or if they have fabulous recommendations – I don't care about someone else's opinion of what's good. I'm picky as heck and rarely get good suggestions from Google or Spotify either. Those two things above are just deal killers though. Come on Microsoft, take my money!</p>

  • lordbaal1

    31 August, 2017 - 2:10 pm

    <p>&nbsp;Groove Music is just as good as all the other music services.</p>

  • stlbud

    31 August, 2017 - 5:17 pm

    <p>When will the Groove Android App work with Android Auto? Spotify works. Amazon works. Groove? Nope!</p>

  • dlc96_darren

    01 October, 2017 - 7:55 pm

    <p>I've had a Groove Music subscription before, so I signed my Daughter up under her own account. We were just charged for another month, and never received any tokens from Microsoft.</p><p><br></p><p>This is now twice Groove special offers have failed me.</p><p><br></p><p><span style="background-color: rgb(230, 236, 240); color: rgb(20, 23, 26);">https://twitter.com/dlc96darren/status/759450653240401920</span></p><p><br></p><p>Now if you click on the link to the special offer, it simply says, "We are sorry, the page you requested cannot be found".</p>

  • jwpear

    Premium Member
    27 October, 2017 - 8:58 am

    <p>Have to wonder now in light of this going away–did the right hand not know what the left hand was doing?</p>

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