Audio September 2026

5 apps for the audio your music app can't play

Spotify and Apple Music cover songs and almost nothing else. These five reach the audio they do not carry: live radio, your own files, podcasts, library audiobooks, and a track slowed down to practise against.

The apps for the audio your music app can't play are TuneIn, MusicPal, Pocket Casts, Libby and Anytune. I built MusicPal; the other 4 are other developers’ apps.

MiaAppLog— an iOS developer who reviews other people’s apps
Published September 2026 · apps and prices last checked 13 October 2026

Four stars is my score for how well an app answers this moment. An app I built gets four and a half — that is a rule, not a comparison. The App Store’s own average is on each card beside it.

1. 

   TuneIn

   ★★★★★★★★★★4.0 · Free · Music · App Store 4.7 (1,121,561)

   TuneIn carries over 100,000 live AM/FM stations from around the world — plus the game you'd otherwise be reading the score of.

   Skip it if you are paying to lose the ads: reviewers with the premium subscription say they still get them, and stations have quietly left the free tier.

   Official site ↗More lists with TuneIn

   
2. 

   MusicPal Editor’s pick

   ★★★★★★★★★★4.5 · Free · Music · App Store 5.0 (2)

   MusicPal takes a link and leaves you the audio. The files you already own land in the same library. No ads, no account, no feed.

   App Store ↗More lists with MusicPal

   
3. 

   Pocket Casts

   ★★★★★★★★★★4.0 · Free · News · App Store 4.5 (16,074)

   Pocket Casts is podcasts by people who listen to them: hand-curated recommendations, playlists you build yourself, and no need to subscribe to try one.

   Skip it if you paid for it years ago: ads and a subscription arrived anyway, and the complaints about the tiny player controls have gone unanswered for a long time.

   Official site ↗More lists with Pocket Casts

   
4. 

   Libby

   ★★★★★★★★★★4.0 · Free · Book · App Store 4.9 (4,559,348)

   Libby is your library card in an app. Borrow ebooks and audiobooks from your local library for free — stream them, or keep them offline.

   Skip it if you listen offline in the car — downloaded audiobooks refusing to play without a connection is the recurring report, and the waiting list is your library's, not the app's.

   Official site ↗More lists with Libby

   
5. 

   Anytune

   ★★★★★★★★★★4.0 · Free · Music · App Store 4.8 (8,539)

   Anytune lets you play along at your own pace: slow a song down, loop the hard bar, transcribe it by ear. Built for learning a song, not for listening to one.

   Skip it if you expect looping to be quick: the free version stops after three imports, and marking the start and end of a bar is fiddlier than it sounds.

   Official site ↗More lists with Anytune

   

MusicPal is one of mine — everything else on this list is someone else’s app. How that works.