Presto Music

This app is missing a number of basic features that any streaming music app should have. There is no shuffle mode, no user-created playlists, and no CarPlay support. Direct support for the Sonos ecosystem would be welcome too at some point so the user doesn’t have to chew up their device’s battery for AirPlay, but first things first.

Presto Classical’s article “Our Streaming Journey - Part 1” was critical to my being pretty sure already that I will continue with a paying subscription at end of trial, specifically because you mention user-creatable playlists in your plans for the next 6-12 months. The lack of knowing whether Apple will bring any new features to their Apple Music Classical app is why I’m leaving them. They don’t seem to respect listeners enough to talk to us about what they’re doing and planning! Please continue the “Journey” articles to keep us informed! Also, I want to say that the way you present the music is superior to anything I’ve seen with the other current services, and I’ve tried them all: Apple Music Classical, IDAGIO, Qobuz, Tidal, Spotify, etc. Like the the now-defunct Primephonic before they sold to Apple, I feel like your service has humans on the other end (honorable mention to Qobuz editorials). Your organization by album has a real organic feel, like browsing in a music store (please do not prioritize playlists over this approach, when you roll those out). The Contents, About, Explore, and Purchase tabs under each album are genuinely helpful and informative. The arrangement of information under the Content tab alone is so polished in design that it reminds me of the track listings in CD liner notes. The Explore tab further proves you’re on top of the metadata with album-related links to composers, works, artists, recording label, and genres. And the complete booklets/liner notes are indispensable when it comes to really getting into the music, not to mention there’s no libretto for opera otherwise. Finally, your pay-per-second vs. pay-per-track for remuneration of recording artists really makes sense for classical, and I fully support this approach! Outstanding work, overall. I’ll patiently wait for the curated and user-creatable playlists. Thank you so much!

Jazz and classical.

Update: in addition to the problems I listed elsewhere in the review, they have now scammed me out of $15. Two days ago, I logged onto their site and filled out the form to cancel the service during the free trial. Today, they charged me anyway. Even if their customer service refunds my money, a service that makes non-consensual charges has no business being offered to the public. There’s no playlist functionality. The track jog shuttle is located in the same place as the where you swipe to switch to another app, so switching apps often jumps the playing track. The whole UI feels more like a website than an app. Not on par with the rest.

I use it for streaming and music and artist reviews. Love its reviews and rankings. Great audio quality. I like the size of the album layouts. Looking forward to promised playlist feature.

The new version is so much harder to use and so buggy that I deleted it.

I can no longer filter or search my own music! I’ve purchased a LOT of music from Presto and now I have to browse through my entire library every time. This needs to be fixed! Other suggestions: playlists and/or tagging. Allowing saving of individual pieces instead of just albums.

It’s a really wonderful app. My only small complaint would be that single tracks purchased do not appear in the library only albums. Apart from that it’s a beautifully designed simple app.

I can only listen entire albums that I have purchased. The individual tracks that I bought do not show up in this app.

This app is everything I ever wanted to play my hi-res downloads. I’ve been a customer of Presto Music for several years and have bought many downloads. I’ve been using VOX to play the files on my computer and mobile devices. But now Presto has put out their own app and it is amazing. Right now I can only play the downloads I’ve bought from Presto Music. In addition to full track listings and a beautiful, easy way to play the music, the app also provides full digital booklets where available, which is on most of my purchases. It allows playback and downloads at lower bit rates when concerned about cellular charges or storage space. Simply a great app.