It’s rare to see Apple add options to iOS that let you define the app you really want to use to accomplish something like the default, instead of forcing you to use the official Apple app. And while I doubt that you’ll be able to use anything other than the App Store to get new software on your iPhone (without unlocking it), at least you’ll soon be able to choose which app you want to use to play your music by default.
This frequently discussed feature is expected to be part of iOS 14.5, but there was a small, difficult patch in its development: the option appeared in the beta, came out in a subsequent update and is now back. This is normal, however – and now that it’s back, I’m confident it will appear in the final version of iOS 14.5 when it arrives.
If you want to verify this configuration now, you will have to go through the normal iOS 14.5 beta installation process from the developer (version 3, at the time of this writing). That is it’s not hard to do, but as always, I will remind you that installing a beta operating system risks slowing down your phone, making some applications more complicated, or causing a number of other peculiar problems that will not be fixed until later in the beta (or with the final version).
There is no setting that you tap to change your default music player, which is a curious omission that I hope Apple will add to the version shipped with iOS 14.5. Instead, you will have to ask Siri to play music, like ordering a song from your favorite band. When you do this – and if you have multiple music apps installed on your device – you will be asked to choose one as the default.
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From now, you only have one chance with this. What you choose becomes the standard for your future “Hey Siri” commands, and it takes some excitement around to get the prompt to load again if you change your mind. (Again, it would be much easier to have it like an option somewhere in Settings> Music, but what do I know?)
That said, if you still want to play music from different services or applications installed on your device, all you need to do is add the name of that service to your request, and Siri will obey. So, for example, you could say “Play Nine Inch Nails” for hear via The default service that you previously selected. Or you can say, “Play Nine Inch Nails on Spotify” to start the song on this app.
That is one admittedly awkward way of defining a default music player on iOS, but that’s how things are (for now). We will update this article if, or when, the steps change in a subsequent beta.