Shazam launches offline mode! Here's how it works

Shazam on iPhone
Shazam on iPhone (Image credit: iMore)

A little over a week ago, Apple bought the extremely popular music discovery app Shazam, and that caused some people to speculate that perhaps the app would be shut down. Well, today Shazam released a new update that allows users to discover music offline.

Shazam has long been a solution to the question "What song is playing?", but you always needed to be online to use it. Starting today, that's all changing! Here's how Shazam's offline mode works!

How Shazam offline works

The good news is the basic operation of Shazam works the same whether you're online or offline.

  1. Launch Shazam from your Home screen.
  2. Tap the Shazam button.
  3. Wait for Shazam to identify the song.

The difference between online and offline operation is when you're offline the app will give you an alert letting you know that Shazam will identify the song as soon as your back online. When you reach a Wi-Fi or data signal again, you can open up the app and look in the My Shazam section to see what song you were listening to when you didn't have service!

What does this mean for the future of Shazam?

With the acquisition of Shazam by Apple still very fresh — and likely still going through a legal process — that's still anybody's guess. I have been a Shazam user since I got my first BlackBerry back in 2009. I hope the app sticks around as a standalone app, but I am curious to see what Apple has in store for the music discovery platform in the future.

What do you think?

Excited to be able to identify music offline? Are you hopeful that Apple will make Shazam better? Let us know in the comments down below!

Luke Filipowicz
Staff Writer

Luke Filipowicz has been a writer at iMore, covering Apple for nearly a decade now. He writes a lot about Apple Watch and iPad but covers the iPhone and Mac as well. He often describes himself as an "Apple user on a budget" and firmly believes that great technology can be affordable if you know where to look. Luke also heads up the iMore Show — a weekly podcast focusing on Apple news, rumors, and products but likes to have some fun along the way. 


Luke knows he spends more time on Twitter than he probably should, so feel free to follow him or give him a shout on social media @LukeFilipowicz.