Univershuffle is out now!
Features, functionality, and some feelings
Welcome to the Univershuffle launch day spectacular issue of Music App Stuff! It’s not every day there’s a new Music App round these parts. We’re going to talk the whats, hows, and whys of the app, and who knows, we might even learn a thing or two about ourselves along the way. But first, a download button:
What is Univershuffle?
Univershuffle is an iOS and macOS app that shuffles all the music in the universe. It’s a way to break out of your musical bubble; chaotic neutral music discovery, completely unmediated by AI and algorithms. You’re literally shuffling everything.
That idea might click immediately with some of you. An infinite, random amble through the genres, languages, and emotions of the world. Others of you—us—might have a bit more, shall we say, ritual around our music listening. I’ve spent five years working on an app for the nit-pickiest, most proscriptive music listeners, because I’m one of them. Who wants a bunch of random crap when I’ve got a tightly-curated music library?
And fair enough! I can speak only for myself, but that’s actually the thing I’ve found most valuable about Univershuffle: there actually turn out to be times when a bunch of random crap might do me some good. I’ve been using the app a lot on walks, letting my mind wander with the music. Having thoughts and making connections I wouldn’t otherwise make, thanks to creative energies I wouldn’t have otherwise been exposed to. I’m trying out transience. I’m embracing ephemera. Low-stakes music listening; who would’ve thought!
That should just about do it with the heady stuff. Let’s get into what the app actually does.
Features and Functionality
The first time you launch Univershuffle, you’ll need to select your music provider. If you’ve got an Apple Music subscription, you can listen to full songs. Otherwise, the app plays 30-second samples.
The main screen of the app is the now playing screen, which is themed to the artwork of the song you’re listening to. The interactive bar toward the bottom allows you to toggle between the song’s genre(s), album name, year, and country (if available). For even more information, you can tap the artist’s name to search them on the web, and if you’re running iOS 18, the app will translate titles in other languages.
Once you’ve stumbled upon a song you like, you can tap the “…” button to do all sorts of things with it or its artist or album, like:
Open it in another app, including Apple Music and Spotify, as well as third-party players like Albums and Marvis.
Add it to your Apple Music or Spotify library
Add it to an Apple Music or Spotify playlist
Add it to MusicBox
Open the Share Sheet
Rounding out the basic functionality, Univershuffle offers a toggle to disable explicit music, interactive widgets to control playback from the Home Screen, support for Shortcuts, and syncs your data across iCloud. All of that is completely free and unlimited. Discover 10,000 songs and don’t pay me a dime!
Univershuffle Premium
But dimes, my dear, make the world go round. There are indeed a couple of features behind the Univershuffle Premium paywall. Let’s talk about what they are, then let’s talk about the pricing model.
Customize the Default Action
Ah, clocked the lightning bolt button in the screenshot, did you? That’s the Action Button. By default it opens the current song in Apple Music, but with Univershuffle Premium you can configure it to do any of the app’s supported actions. I have mine configured to add the current song to an Apple Music playlist I have called “Univershuffle.”
Excluding Genres
Nobly breaking out of our bubbles though we are, sometimes you just don’t want to hear a particular kind of music. I found that my shuffling sessions became much more fruitful once I told the app which genres I wasn’t interested in.
Hiding Ads
After your 10th song, a screen will pop up asking if you’d like to upgrade to Premium. If you choose not to, the now playing screen will start showing a banner ad from then on. The Premium upgrade screen will also pop up again from time to time in case you have a change of heart. Upgrading to Premium removes these annoyances.
Pricing Model
Univershuffle Premium is available on a sliding scale, with several tiers of options for both one-time and subscription unlocks. It’s vibes-based pricing. Look deep within yourself. If you want to pay $5 once, cool, you have Univershuffle Premium forever. If you want to subscribe for $75/year, cool you have Univershuffle Premium forever. Once you’ve unlocked Premium, you can return to the Premium screen to give a tip at whatever level (and frequency!) you so choose.
My hope here is to meet people where they’re at. Not gonna get too capitalism-y here, but hey, this is the pricing model subhead. I’m passionate about continuing to work on both Univershuffle and Albums for the long haul, and, well, the more money they make, the easier that is to do. Whatever your deeply-held convictions about one-time vs subscription pricing, under or over-valuation of digital goods, et cetera, I hope there’s an option you feel good about.
Conclusion
Let’s see, what else, what else? Oh, yeah, the icon was designed by Vaughn Chambers, who also made the redesigned Albums icon earlier this year. I love that little astronaut.
Thanks for reading, thanks for your support, thanks broadly for being the kind of person who finds themselves on this corner of the internet. Have a wonderful start to your year, and happy univershuffling! I’ll leave you with none other than one last button to download the app.