Remember Google Assistant’s hum-to-search feature? Which let you find songs online by simply humming them into your phone? That feature is now making its way to YouTube Music.
The YouTube Music app for Android will soon let you hum to search, an implementation similar to Shazam, or like asking a friend “Hey what’s that song that goes…” right before you hum out a bar. You can also sing, whistle, or play a recording of a song to find it.
If the feature has reached you already, it should appear in the search section of the app in the form of a new button with a waveform icon next to the microphone icon that appears when you press the search button. The app will start listening to your replication of a song as soon as you press this waveform button.
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In a few tests performed by The Verge, the new search feature was working as intended. It can find songs accurately and with uncanny speed, making for an excellent replacement for Shazam. It is also faster than Google Assistant’s hum-to-search feature.
The YouTube Music feature works well with whistling and singing too, not just humming. However, it can make wrong guesses from time to time, but mostly for songs that are hard to figure out with just a few seconds of humming.
According to recent reports, humming to search has been seen within YouTube Music for iOS in recent months. However, widespread availability seems to be pending.
