Optus customers rejoice, you can now stream hours of music without any impact on your mobile data allowance. Optus today announced a bunch of features for customers including free streaming for major music services.

Optus Music brings unmetered music streaming to prepaid mobile customers. Spotify, Pandora, Google Play Music and more will all be available data-free, with customers also getting access to gigs. Music is the soundtrack to our lives, so keep the tunes playing on the go with Optus. Start streaming your favourite tunes without data on your preferred device.

Specifically listed by Optus are Spotify, Google Play Music, iHeartRadio, Pandora and Guvera so no luck for Apple Music listeners it seems, but free data would be enough to make people switch to Spotify I’m betting.

Check the fine print, because it’s not “all Optus customers”, but from May 2″ new and existing customers on My Prepaid Ultimate, My Prepaid Daily Plus and other selected plans” can access the free data streaming.

It’s part of a suite of music products the telco is launching, including new live music experiences, meet-and-greets and other ticket opportunities and discounts of 15 percent off music products in a new customised music store.

Your move Telstra and Vodafone.

Optus is trying to win customers worried about music-streaming data limitsSource:News Limited

Optus is looking to cement its place in the market as a premium content-focused player, with the telco offering customers data-free access to a raft of music streaming services.

The music service will see Optus give its prepaid mobile customers unmetered access to Spotify, Pandora, Google Play Music, iHeartRadio and Guvera.

The one name missing from the list is Apple Music and there’s no guarantee that the service will join Optus’s fold in the near ­future. Optus managing director of marketing and product Ben White said the telco was actively “talking to a range of additional partners”, including Apple. Apple Music is available to Telstra customers after the incumbent telco launched the service last August. Telstra is offering new and recontracting postpaid mobile customers who take up Apple Music an additional 500MB of data a month. However, it does not offer data-free music streaming.

While Optus customers won’t have to tap into their data allowance to listen to music, they will need to have data or credit on their accounts. Downloads, video and non-music content are also excluded from the scheme. Optus’s music service, which will be available from May 2, is the first concerted effort by a local telco to bring the major music streaming outfits under one umbrella.

While music streaming services have made swift inroads into the Australian market, according to Mr White, data constraints continue to be the single biggest pain point for mobile consumers.

The latest figures released by the Australian Recording Industry Association highlighted a 5 per cent increase in the value of Australian recorded music in 2015, buoyed by the continued growth of digital streaming services. With streaming accounting for 62 per cent of the overall market, the value of subscription-based services like Spotify and Apple Music also doubled in 2015, from $23 million to $46m. The positive growth trajectory is a clear attraction for Optus and Mr White said taking data out of the equation would deliver another boost to adoption.

“We’re confident these plans will break down the data barrier and convince more Aussies to try music streaming,” Mr White said.

The music service adds to Optus’s growing stable of content assets. The telco already provides unmetered access to Netflix and Stan. It has also secured exclusive rights to the English Premier League and Cricket Australia.

Mr White is confident that Optus’s infrastructure is robust enough to cope with any additional pressure the free music service may exert on its network. An average song uses about 6MB of data. “We have worked hard with our partners for this service to understand the sort of throughput requirements their services need and ensure that we have the ability to deliver a quality service to our customers,” he said.

Optus customers will also gain access to over 20 live music events each year via Optus’s partnerships with Universal Music and iHeart­Radio; and 15 per cent off music products via a customised music store.

Optus Spotify Free Streaming Channels

Optus Prepaid Free Spotify Streaming

Originally published asOptus turns up volume for music