Apple says only 1 in 5 people have quit Apple Music
Apple has said that only 21 percent of United States users who have tested Apple Music no longer use it, countering the results of a survey that found defection rates at more than twice that amount.
In a survey of 5,000 people in the US, released on Tuesday, music industry research company MusicWatch found that 48 percent of those who had tried out the new online music-streaming service had stopped using it.
However, Apple said that the number is much lower.
Featured
"Seventy-nine percent of people who signed up for a trial are using the service," a spokesman for the company said.
In the MusicWatch survey, 28 percent of respondents who were trying out Apple Music said they also had Spotify Premium subscriptions. However, only 11 percent were users of the free version of Spotify, and 6 percent used the free version of internet radio Pandora.
To edge its way into the music-streaming market, Apple has offered a three-month trial period to new subscribers, after which subscriptions cost $10 per month.
Apple has long been a key player in the digital music landscape thanks to its iTunes store, and is hoping to capitalise on that established user base, with a goal of reaching 100 million Apple Music users.
Earlier this month, Apple's head of internet software and services, Eddy Cue, said the newcomer music service had 11 million users.
At the time, Apple said 2 million of those 11 million customers were on family plans, which allow six people to be on a single plan for $15 a month.
Spotify has 20 million paid subscribers and 75 million users overall, according to its website.
When Apple Music was announced at Apple's WorldWide Developer Conference in June, the company said it would be launching an app for Android, but it has yet to deliver on that promise.
At the time, Apple said it wanted to see 100 million subscribers on its music platform. In January, Apple announced that it had sold 1 billion iOS devices.
In Australia, dominant telco Telstra is offering customers a 12-month membership to Apple Music, as it shutters its own music-streaming service, MOG.
Last month, Telstra announced it would be closing MOG at the end of August after three years of service. Weeks after being launched in June 2012, MOG was bought by Beats for $14 million, and the service in the US would become Beats Music.
In May last year, Apple acquired Beats for $3.2 billion, with Beats Music combining with iTunes Radio to form the basis of Apple Music.
With AAP