Groove Music killing OneDrive track streaming on March 31

By Dan Thorp-Lancaster
published

The final nail in the coffin.

Groove Music has been on its way out since it ended its Groove Music Pass streaming service at the end of 2017, but it still retained the ability to stream your own tracks from OneDrive, making it at least somewhat useful for those who still preferred the app. However, that's all coming to an end soon, as Microsoft has announced OneDrive streaming will get the ax on March 31.

In a new FAQ page (opens in new tab) posted to its support site, Microsoft says that "OneDrive music streaming in Groove Music will be retired" at the end of March. And while the tracks you have stored in OneDrive will still be able to be played using OneDrive's web player, you'll no longer be able to stream them from the cloud in Groove Music.

So what will happen to your music? Microsoft explains:

Music stored in your OneDrive will stop syncing with Groove Music on March 31, 2019. Data stored in the Groove Music service will be deleted up to 30 days after that. Your music will still be available in OneDrive and your downloaded music and playlists will still be available in the Groove Music app.

Your only solution to keep playing your files in Groove will be to download your complete collection and store it locally on whatever device you're using to listen to music through Groove.

According to the FAQ, this ends the ability to stream your OneDrive-stored music for Forza Horizon 3 starting on March 31 as well.

If you'd rather keep streaming, there are plenty of other options out there. Microsoft itself has been recommending people make the switch to Spotify, and it has set up a process for making the move from Groove Music. If you've got a large OneDrive music collection and want the option to keep streaming from there, a Windows 10 app called Sonca (opens in new tab) is a great alternative that works with music you have stored in a variety of cloud services.

Thanks, Richard H., for the tip!

Dan Thorp-Lancaster
Dan Thorp-Lancaster

Dan Thorp-Lancaster is the former Editor-in-Chief of Windows Central. He began working with Windows Central, Android Central, and iMore as a news writer in 2014 and is obsessed with tech of all sorts. You can follow Dan on Twitter @DthorpL and Instagram @heyitsdtl. 

148 Comments
  • Sad day was really hoping they would keep this player as is. Well looks like more 3rd party work arounds to do things windows once did.
  • Sad part is that there are no good alternatives... I just tried Sonca by Finebits OU - the interface is bad, the sync from OneDrive lumps EVERYTHING in one artist with one album. Unusable.
  • Why continue using Onedrive? There are so many good steaming services available now.
  • Tool! Not that you're a tool...lol...the band Tool. They are not yet allowing streaming services access to their music. I'm sure there are other artist on some combination of streaming services that aren't available too. Tool is the first that comes to mind.
  • Other holdovers have since relented, like acdc Metallica and idk was Motorhead ever against it? Oh the Beatles right? They're one of the last...
  • You do realize that not everyone actually likes, much less uses, streaming services, right? I have no use for the random mess that comes out of every...single...service. We have a LARGE library of music we actually LIKED enough to PURCHASE LEGITIMATELY. We carefully curated the metadata. It now lives on our OneDrive storage. With Groove, we could play OUR music by Album, Artist or Playlist without having to endure that garbage thrown at us by all those streaming services. What Microsoft is doing is removing a way for us to stream JUST our music the way we want it. Now we have to figure out an alternative.
  • Plus my music is in lossless format.
  • Ripped from CDs? Lol
  • "Now we have to figure out an alternative" Given you're such a strong MS user Rob I would have thought you would be used to this by now with the demise of WM and the retreat from supporting consumer Cortana.
  • Google Play Music does a great job of this and has a great streaming service. I am not sure if anyone else is still doing the music locker thing. I used to do the same thing. It was tedious and a pain to transfer these huge folders and files. I uploaded it all to Google Play Music and occasionally still access my own songs. With the streaming service it is now rare. They have most everything and it takes no work. Just $15 a month for a family YouTube/Music subscription.
  • Google Play Music doesn't have updates since forever and will be deactivated i soon. It also does not have any offline capabilities for W10.
  • I too have a lot of good older music not avail on Spotify. A few tracks that are, are not originals but instead remakes or "tribute" bands.
  • OK gang. I just talked to Microsoft Support. This change is only for online streaming of your OneDrive Music into Groove. However is you use the OneDrive status "Always keep on this drive" and you keep OneDrive synced, you can continue to play your music collection on your laptop, tablet, phone. I have always done this. Of course, you must have sufficient space on your local drive and you would have to keep all of your devices synced.
    As I use OneDrive for all of my data and always keep my devices synced, I will see no change at all with this MSFT announcement. If you do the same, life simply continues on as is.
    It sounds like they are simply reducing the cost of high volume active connections to their server farms.
  • Let me see. Free space on my device: 25GB. Total size of my music collection: 100GB.
  • I have a second drive (D:) of 200GB on all my portable devices, including my phone, I use for music and more. I can actively sync Office files as I use them and don't use "Always keep on this device status" for those. Storage is getting cheaper and cheaper.
  • Sorry, that's just a poor replacement. I'm not carrying an extra 200 GB thing just for my music collection.
  • An extra 200GB thing? It’s an SD card. I have a 128GB card in my remaining Lumia 1520. It is pretty much only used these days as a big, somewhat clunky, MP3 player.
  • It's an internal SDXC on all my devices.
  • For the next few months until they cancel Groove completely. Just pull the band-aid off now. Get it over with. Microsoft services outside work requirements are dead.
  • Will it sync playlists across devices?
  • you can stop posting this non-sense. the whole point is that we DONT want to store the music locally.
  • Why not streaming ----- simple, there are SO many bands and albums that the streaming services simply do not provide. In fact, when Groove provided streaming, it was the absolute best in terms of the music I like - I don't think I found a band/musician who was not on the service. Something to do with them offering decent terms to the musicians for their work (unlike pretty much all the other streaming services, who are effectively killing music by the pittance that they pay for streamed tracks).
  • Streamed music is normally compressed to hell. I have a large lossless music collection. The difference is amazing
  • Erm no it isn’t. I stream via Apple
    Music which is 256 bit AAC. Try as I might I just can’t hear any difference between this and a raw CD rip.
  • Perhaps, your sound system isn't as good as pdch's?
  • Google Play Music has been a thing for a while. There was never a reason to care about this since mobile was the only form factor where it was a factor. On PCs you just kept the music local on a HDD or SD and let the app scan that location. This ceased to be a selling point after Windows Mobile died. The thing that makes OneDrive less attractive is the lack of developer support. Everyone is integrating with DropBox and Google Drive (and iCloud on Apple platforms), but even Windows develops9seem to forsake OneDrive. Keeping an entire Microsoft account open just for OneDrive simply isn't attractive in the current cyber landscape, and Office doesn't make it easy for those of us who can "get by with less" with its shoddy cloud service support on third party platforms (inability to leave to Google Drive or iCloud by default, etc.). When I ditched OneDrive, I also ditched office because what it offered me what enough to zero out the inconveniences using it on Android or iOS. Alternatives (WordPerfect and LibreOffice on Desktop; Google, Apple, and Hancom apps on mobile - all free) offer more than enough functionality for me...
  • This is awful. This makes Groove a useless app for me. Might as well uninstall it completely.
  • You can in 19H1 1903.
    Mobile as well.
  • That's my plan.
  • Yup! I guess I'll be going back to Windows Media Player to hear that one track here and there before uploading them to Google Play Music
  • I still use WMP for editing Metadata and managing my music collection, but it was never great for extended listening. And Groove Music was such a great app, truly the epitome of Fluent Design and Windows 10. Not anymore.
  • And yet Spotify still hasn't made a UWP app despite being Microsoft's preferred replacement... This doesn't leave many quality options available as we move towards Windows Core OS.
  • That's crazy considering Apple put iTunes in the store. I ended up switching from Groove to Amazon. Then Amazon ended their stored track streaming and I switched to Apple Music. Surprisingly I enjoy it quite a bit. Could work better on Alexa, but i'm sure they will get that worked out.
  • funny they have a UWP for XBOX that could make easily available on all devices
  • What other devices? They have an app two apps for pc and an Xbox app. What other uwp app are they missing for devices?
  • To be honest I don't like the UI of the Xbox version, though I appreciate it being available on Xbox in the first place.
  • So what other apps are there that can stream albums/songs from OneDrive? This was one of the main reasons I kept using Groove. Playing song by song by navigating to folders is not a good user experience.
  • If you keep OneDrive synced (available offline), you can point Groove to include that folder and it'll show you your music like it used to.
  • can you still sync playlists across devices?
  • Boo to that!
  • This is one more clue showing that Microsoft is working only for pro and business users. The family consumer, like me, will go to Apple : music, video, photo, personal assistant… looks better there. So sad.
  • If this is the case, then why would anyone use MS? Most people use the same computer for work and pleasure. Why would I get a surface (or 3rd party devices) when I can't do anything for personal use on it? It would be a waste. I might as well get a mac laptop or chromebook, right?
  • That's right. It seems this is what Microsoft wants. They are not really interested in consumers. XBox and Surface remain only because people buy those. No doubt that the second either start to fail Microsoft will cut them off as well. Microsoft is a business/developer centric company first and foremost. If you are a consumer there are far better solutions and ecosystems to use. I'm a big Microsoft fan but there is no denying what is clearly happening.
  • Sigh. Microsoft has killed off so many cool products, services, and features in the past half decade alone that I can't even keep count of them anymore.
  • MS actually hasn't killed off Groove, just using it to stream. It will continue to be useable with OneDrive music if it is synced "Always keep on this drive" status is used. MS is attacking the cost of streaming just as Amazon did (the two largest Cloud services).
  • Nope, it's a profit generation measure as you need to take into account the redudancy and back ups required. Plus the bandwidth usage, in the grand scheme of things it's peanuts for them but the bean counters are being pushed to increase profit in any shape or form.
  • Can you still sync playlists across devices?
  • Was crappy when they killed Groove on Android and continues to be crappy when they don't even support it on their own cloud service. Spotify isn't a replacement for people who already have their own music collection
  • THIS! YES! You are so right. I will ever use Spotify as my daily player. I am so angry with MSFT right now!
  • Not to mention the Spotify apps (even the ones Spotify hasn't disabled) are terrible and clunky. The desktop app hasn't changed in any meaningful way in a decade, and there's no web player on mobile (well actually there is, but they inexplicably don't let anyone use it). It's missing about half the features of Groove Music Pass and of the Groove app itself, including OneDrive integration, (real) smart playlists, (real) download, and music videos.
  • Plus Spotify search on the mobile app has been broken since the last update.
  • Spotify is good for streaming but its not a replacement. I can only find half of my locally stored files on it. Its horrible in that sense.
  • I can't stream our OneDrive library using Spotify.
  • Rob, I can't confirm the quality but I've read elsewhere of a Store music app called Next-Player. It may be worth checking out but keep your expectations realistic. No solution is going to work as well as your current set up.
  • You are kidding me 😟
  • Damn, I miss Groove Music Pass and the Groove Music app
  • Agreed Ferenc, I used to really like the Groove UI. After MS killed Groove Music Pass I moved to Google play Music which is excellent but the UI is terrible compared to Groove.
  • If you really like the Groove UI, you can still use it, but not with streaming from the OneDrive Cloud storage. If you have enough local space, you can use Groove while syncing using the status "Always keep on this drive", and auto syncing will keep all devices up to date.
    This is not a Groove issue; it is a streaming infrastructure cost issue. Amazon did the same thing.
  • A wonderful piece of enlightenment on Groove Music.But certain people are just fun of criticism.Its clear now that you explained.We can continue to enjoy our OneDrive stored music.
  • Fantastic. So we can use the app by copying all our files onto our phone. This is exactly what people here want.
  • I really miss it too! I use Amazon Music unlimited now.
  • Amazon Music is completely lame by comparison. Completely.
  • There is NOTHING you can say to convince me that Microsoft doesn't hate regular consumers. Once Groove dies, we have no way to have Cortana stream our music from OneDrive.
  • Stop using Microsoft services. It has and will bring you nothing but frustration. There are much better alternatives available in 2019. That is why they are dieing.
  • says the dude who posts DAILY on MS forums
  • He's mad at MS because his Zune broke, and they wouldn't replace it. 😭😭😭😭
  • I am also mad at Microsoft. My phone got lost, got a new one and I tried to synch my Apps back, but found a Developer has removed the App I bought from the Store according to Microsoft. Microsoft says I should contact the developer but they never provided his contact details and I have been unable to locate the guy. Now, all my saved passwords and important details are locked and unusable, because Password Jinni which I bought from Microsoft is no more available. I have issues recovering a lot of my accounts.
  • Have you bought an Android device yet?
  • @Emi Mimo can't you download Password Jinni via my app library? I looked up Password Jinni and it's a pretty old app... this is what I found - http://allaboutwindowsphone.com/reviews/item/14631_Password_Jinni.php
  • Mine got stolen many moons ago, saddest day of my life... 😭
  • So, what's your point?
  • This comment is really a killjoy. Can't I continue to enjoy it while it last? Nothing is forever you know.
  • I just loved the Groove interface, and design. The service, playback, and library, were horrible compared to Spotify. There were many times a song wouldn't play that was in the library because MS would temporarily lose rights. That was extremely annoying, especially when you're paying monthly subscription fees. Spotify is just like Android; extremely ugly to look at, but very functional, and it works great for most everything you need.
  • Well, as someone that uses Spotify as a backup, I can say that albums disappear for lack of rights there too. This is a problem every streaming platform suffers from.
  • "There is NOTHING you can say to convince me that Microsoft doesn't hate regular consumers" If you truly feel that way then why do you continue to support MS by using their products and services?
  • For those who already made the jump to Android I can recommend Cloud Player Platinum by Doubletwist. I've been using it for about 8 or 9 months and it works very well. It allows streaming from OneDrive and also streams FLAC files. Curiously, I've just started looking for a desktop replacement for Groove as I'm fed up with it not streaming FLAC files from OneDrive (it only plays them locally). Now this happens. But I haven't found anything yet. Sonca has lousy comments in the store though. So I'll have to keep looking or hope that someone else finds something and posts here.
  • Exactly what I use! And I just bought Sonca for the Xbox and tablet! It's on sale right now, get while you can!
  • Just tried sonca - complete garbage, unusable UI, sync from OneDrive lumps all my collection in one artist with one album and 6700+ songs. I'm not paying money for this.
  • Crud....and I was about to look into that app, too. Why would someone write an app that stupidly?
  • Yea, I tried it too, $2 so whatever. But I agree, it is garbage, especially when compared to Groove or CloudPlayer that I use on my Android phone. If CloudPlayer released a Windows app I wouldn't miss Groove at all.
  • Only no serious dev is writing anything for UWP. And why would they if Microsoft can't be trusted with supporting their own platform.
  • Especially with your desktop and large (newer) laptops, you can continue to use Groove by syncing your music with your OneDrive using the status "Always keep on this drive".
  • Yes, but will playlists still sync?
  • Why is it still called Groove anyway? The music stopped making sense when they discontinued the streaming service. Just rename it to "Music" or something.
  • I switched to Google music. I spent more than a week uploading my library. But it's the only one that I found that works on phones, pc and my car And it's free!
  • I refuse to use Google's disgusting stuff.
  • Your loss, but it works very well.
  • I usually do as well. I think they are a horrible, horrible company. Between their advertising model, their shady disclosures of breaches with Google+/VPN app, some things their C level has said, and the fact they have employees who have to watch horrible YouTube videos for 4 hours a day... They suck. When I can I use something else.
  • Careful, Google can do the same thing. The cost of storage is low, but streaming infrastructure is expensive.
  • Actually no, streaming infrastructure is expensive to install but the hardware is constantly utilised. So it pays for itself over time, this is just another profit generation exercise.
  • I tried it and couldn't get it to work for me, I hate their designs and branding, like bizarro deluxe 🤮
  • mmm thanks *******
  • I'm definitely going to miss Groove Music for this feature, particularly on my Xbox. I'll give Sonca a try I guess.
  • WTF Microsoft?! I use this to listen to my MP3 collection on my phone all the time. I have playlists made for workouts and the like. Why would you go out of your way to remove this ability? It's not an app that you are retiring.
  • I think their strategy will be to drive as many users off Groove as they can and then claim low usage of the app and kill it.
  • I think the new model for all cloud storage services is to first cancel streaming, then offer pay services.
  • The thing is, this might drive me completely away from Xbox. I already cancelled Office 365 because of this. I listened to almost all my music on Xbox Groove, now I can't. We stream Netflix, Hulu, Prime, HBO etc on the Xbox, but we also use Roku and Amazon devices. Why power on the hungry and hot Xbox? Hell, they never gave us the promised DVR. We game a little but not enough to use it as a primary device. Certainly no need to upgrade to an X or S.
  • Literally the only reason I keep an Office 365 subscription. Looks like I don't need the extra storage anymore. Time to cancel.
  • Same here. Already cancelled the subscription and bought a micro SD card to keep all my music on it.
  • Maybe, if all you store on OneDrive is music. But you will still be able to store and stream from OneDrive, just not to Groove.
    A question I have is if Groove will continue to play downloaded music files, does the OneDrive Status "Always keep on this drive" for the local OneDrive count as downloaded. If so, then Groove can continue to be used until it is gone, if ever.
  • OK gang. I just talked to Microsoft Support. This change is only for online streaming of your OneDrive Music into Groove. However is you use the OneDrive status "Always keep on this drive" and you keep OneDrive synced, you can continue to play your music collection on your laptop, tablet, phone. I have always done this. Of course, you must have sufficient space on your local drive and you would have to keep all of your devices synced.
    As I use OneDrive for all of my data and always keep my devices synced, I will see no change at all with this MSFT announcement. If you do the same, life simply continues on as is.
    It sounds like they are simply reducing the cost of high volume active connections to their server farms.
  • If you keep all your drivers synchronized, there's no use to keep a OneDrive account.
  • If it is actually on your drive, yes. We do NOT have our music flagged as "Always keep on this drive". We'd run out of disk space if we did that (especially on our phones). Any app we use MUST be able to pull directly from OneDrive.
  • Ha, me too, I think I'll now cancel office and just switch to Open Office instead, grab an SD card for 50 bucks and stop giving Microsoft 100 bucks per year, genius move on their part.
  • I just cancelled and removed all payment info from my Microsoft account.
  • So I assume, that they have new app for music connected with Spotify yet If they are cancelling Groove. No? 😲
  • It would be very good idea
  • No. I don't think they do. They are just dropping the ball.
  • Does the OneDrive Sync Status "Always keep on this drive" count as downloaded?
  • Answering my on question. Yes, it does according to MS Support. This is not specifically a Groove issue or Cloud storage issue; it is the Cost of Streaming.
  • I really thought that Spotify would have offered streaming options for OneDrive and the other cloud storage options by now. Why is this not a thing yet!!
  • Have you seen their Windows app? It's so bad. They really don't give two sh**s about desktop users...
  • I never subscribe to anything. However, about 2 years ago I found that I had subscribed to
    QuickBooks on line (loved being able to invoice from anything anywhere)
    Office 365 Plus (tablet, phone, laptop and PC - wife and I both on it)
    Hulu
    Netflix (downloading content to take with you... wow, what a nice feature)
    Groove No cable, no tv, no cds, no dvds. Everything always auto updating, auto syncing. Literally was spending about $45 a month on all of it. I'm always amazed Microsoft hasn't found a way to make money with products that I liked and used.
    MS Small Business Accounting (excellent! though if it were cloud enabled that would have been great).
    Windows Phone (yeah, I just went there) with it's included Office Apps
    Groove (it got really good just before they killed it.. I liked the service). I've never been a Zune or a Band guy... but I guess adopters thought they were pretty good.
  • Actually Groove has not been killed. Just being able to use it with streaming from OneDrive. If you store your music locally with or without OneDrive syncing it will continue to perform as it has. The OneDrive status of "Always keep on this drive" is the same as stored only on your local drive, not synced on OneDrive.
  • So what will it do on Xbox?
  • I didn't ask that question because I don't use Xbox. Support Chat worked well.
  • Exactly. Give us a way to store music on the Xbox and play it regardless of who is logged on.
  • The sad part is that Groove was one of the teams that actually CARED about their app. They were always listening to feedback and doing updates. Now they all watch their baby wither and die.
  • OK gang. I just talked to Microsoft Support. This change is only for online streaming of your OneDrive Music into Groove. However is you use the OneDrive status "Always keep on this drive" and you keep OneDrive synced, you can continue to play your music collection on your laptop, tablet, phone. I have always done this. Of course, you must have sufficient space on your local drive and you would have to keep all of your devices synced.
    As I use OneDrive for all of my data and always keep my devices synced, I will see no change at all with this MSFT announcement. If you do the same, life simply continues on as is.
    It sounds like they are simply reducing the cost of high volume active connections to their server farms.
  • So, which services can stream from OneDrive? I have a bunch of music that isn't available on streaming services because it's obscure, or licensing or whatever. This seems like a good time to move from OneDrive and cancel my O365 sub because the rest of the functionality can be found on other cloud storage services. I'm really starting to hate Microsoft, they seem to be going out of their way to punish the consumers and fans who have bought into their ecosystem. I'm going to slowly extract myself from it, and stop recommending their products at work or to family & friends.
  • OK gang. I just talked to Microsoft Support. This change is only for online streaming of your OneDrive Music into Groove. However is you use the OneDrive status "Always keep on this drive" and you keep OneDrive synced, you can continue to play your music collection on your laptop, tablet, phone. I have always done this. Of course, you must have sufficient space on your local drive and you would have to keep all of your devices synced.
    As I use OneDrive for all of my data and always keep my devices synced, I will see no change at all with this MSFT announcement. If you do the same, life simply continues on as is.
    It sounds like they are simply reducing the cost of high volume active connections to their server farms.
  • I can't imagine cancelling our Office365 subscription. Can't do business without it and the security of OneDrive.
  • OK gang. I just talked to Microsoft Support. This change is only for online streaming of your OneDrive Music into Groove. However is you use the OneDrive status "Always keep on this drive" and you keep OneDrive synced, you can continue to play your music collection on your laptop, tablet, phone. I have always done this. Of course, you must have sufficient space on your local drive and you would have to keep all of your devices synced.
    As I use OneDrive for all of my data and always keep my devices synced, I will see no change at all with this MSFT announcement. If you do the same, life simply continues on as is.
    It sounds like they are simply reducing the cost of high volume active connections to their server farms.
  • You obviously aren't getting it. We specifically ARE streaming our OneDrive library---meaning we DON'T necessarily want to keep the entire library on all our devices. And, in some cases, we CAN'T. Our music library is over 800GB (we converted music from other formats that haven't been available anywhere for decades). So, we're not going to sync that much to every device. And, syncing would defeat the purpose of HAVING it all on the cloud.
  • Actually, I do get it. I see what's going on here and it is not a Groove issue. Since Amazon has also retrenched on streaming, you'll be seeing other server platforms doing the same. Storage is cheap, but streaming bandwidth is expensive. Perhaps the new model will offer separate streaming services as an addon.
    I would say that 800GB is an outlier, but it is no longer unusual to have Terabytes of storage on devices. Do ALL of your devices need ALL 800GB?
    One of the great values of OneDrive is active backup and I use it for everything. It would be silly, especially for a business person, to cancel Office365 just because music streaming is no longer available.
  • I have Office 365 sub to have 1TB of space so I can keep my movies and music there. I keep my music there because its convenient to stream it to devices and also to have it up to date and easily get new music I put there to all devices. Now streaming and uploading music on my PC and downloading it on others via Groove will be impossible. So I can just keep all my music and movies offline. Office apps were a nice bonus, but I can do everything I need to do with OpenOffice or any alternative like that. I know those 60 euros per year or whatever it costs will not even register on a radar for MSFT, but I already ordered a nice SD card to keep all my music in my SP4 for half that price (the shop had a 27% discount because they are celebrating 27th birthday of the shop). All I'm saying, now that I calmed down, its actually not that big of a deal and it will save me 60 eur a year.
  • I have SDXC cards on all my devices where I keep my music locally. OneDrive allows me to keep all of my devices synced, so I can play music everywhere on any device (SP4, S3, 950XL, Dell Venue 8 Pro - all different formats for different uses). I'm never without access to all of my music. For those who have much larger libraries, I wonder if they have a core they ;play all the time vs. hardly ever. Since OneDrive can be selective by folder, music selections can be made to fit and altered as necessary. Until we have TB on all our devices (coming soon) this may be the best way to continue using OneDrive (which I need for business).
  • "I would say that 800GB is an outlier, but it is no longer unusual to have Terabytes of storage on devices." Did you ever look to the prices of the laptops with terabytes of storage? Microsoft it self sells a 64 GB Surface Go.
  • 800GB! Damn, now that's a serious music collection. You obviously have very eclectic music tastes.
  • This was one of the coolest things that a Window 10 Mobile device could do. You could drop a music file in your OneDrive using your PC, and then open Groove on your Window 10 Mobile device, and then just play it without it taking any space on your Window 10 Mobile device. I now have an iPhone. I was looking at the app CloudBeats to try to get something similar to this on the iPhone. Using iTunes to sync music is completely over-engineered. I have a problem with using a third party service for cloud storage music streaming. CloudBeats wants complete read and write access to your OneDrive. NO THANK YOU. I ended up going with using iTunes. I don't really use my iCloud since I pay for OneDrive and don't want to pay for two cloud storage. The default 5GB on iCloud is not enough. So I have to manually sync things with this clucky iTunes app from my PC. Very lame.
  • Very sad day. I tried Spotify and unless you pay for the service they play annoying ads even when you listen to just the music you already own. Sonca does not import my play lists and it needs access to the entire OneDrive which I don't like doing because I have confidential files store there in addition to my music. I also have a Windows phone on which the only thing that works well is the Groove music app. I don't have room to download all my music files to the phone. This is very disappointing that Microsoft cannot provide a basic service that is pretty much standard on Google and Apple products. I thought the cloud was an area of growth for Microsoft. This is going to make me change to Apple or Android for music streaming.
  • What a load of bullshit, I have over 100GB of music on OneDrive, Microsoft just love giving me reasons to get frustrated with them. I already use Cloudplayer on my phone, I'll check it Sonca, but from what someone said it's pretty bad.
  • I'm quite upset about this. I have a Windows 10 PC and an Android phone. I went out of my way to install an old version of the Groove Android app so that I could still use it to stream music from OneDrive and sync playlists between my phone and computer. There is no other app that is available on BOTH Android and Windows 10 that has this functionality. I think I'm going to do something about this... Once I finish University at the end of April, I'm going to look into creating an app for Windows 10 and Android that streams music from OneDrive and syncs playlists across devices. Not sure how I'll do this at the moment since Windows 10 and Android are completely different platforms that require completely different code, but maybe there is something I can use to write the app once and compile it for both Windows 10 and Android... If anybody knows of such a thing then let me know. Right now though, I have exams to study for.
  • I would welcome this if someone could do it! I don't use the streaming from OneDrive a lot, but I do manage my playlists in Groove and having something that could work consistently across Windows 10, Xbox, Windows 10 Mobile (for the next year :-() and Android would be welcome - there simply aren't ANY music players that I can find that can do everything that Groove used to! What a waste!
  • You would be a hero and definitely set up somewhere we can all support you! 💖
  • I'd pay for your app to do that: Sync playlists, stream or access OneDrive Music folder, and be on both Windows 10 and Android. That's all I need.
  • There is no alternative for Groove on the Xbox... And that is a major issue for me. I listen to all muy music (stored on OneDrive) using Groove on the Xbox since it’s what I have connected to my Hi-Fi gear... Sonca is completely unusable.
  • Groove music had the potential of being the ultimate music player app simply by opening up the ability of cloud streaming from any cloud drive. If the OneDrive app could replace Groove Music as a dedicated online/offline player, this wouldn't be such a big loss for windows users. Of course Microsoft hasn't been interested with their consumer customers since Nadella took over. Quite a contrast compared to the Gates era where Microsoft products were designed to reach everyone without being a walled garden.
  • My problem with Spotify is they only match some that THEY have, which sucks because I got awesome albums from some non digital folks, like Tool they're anti digital so what then, DISCS?! 🙄
  • While I acknowledge there are people who still like having their own music and the fact that some bands don't have their music available to stream, I do think the people who want local files are in the minority. I switched to just streaming a while ago and overall don't miss the headache of managing local files.
  • WHY!?? What on Earth would justify this in any way??? It's not like Groove is only relevant on mobile-- the OneDrive integration was the only legitimate way to listen to OneDrive music on desktop. Why doesn't Microsoft just retire Windows, OneDrive, and everything besides Azure if it's going to systematically reduce every single one of its products to nothing.
  • I agree. Will this be a slow death of Microsoft Windows? Why use Windows OS if they are going to kill every app that consumers use across devices. I should just get a Chrome book or macbook and have apps that work, What would I really need Office 365 for when there are alternatives. Are they just doing cloud/Azure/AI services, which they aren't even the leaders in?
  • Exactly! What the hell are they thinking. We know it's not a money maker but now I will move to google drive, Android and dump ALL OF MY MS APPS. Why? because MS offers nothing but Corporate (Azure, Office) So let Windows sit in the corporate world and eventually they will lose that too (yea that's a long way off). But damit! What kind of expense is it so simply leave the tech for us groove users to sync to OD? Thank God for Google and Apple.
  • I'm not surprised it all. I believe at some point the Groove Music app will cease to be. First, they killed of the Groove Music service. Their streaming music service wasn't catching on, too many better established competitors, and they did not steadily improve the app and service. That is why I think it wasn't successful. At this point, the Groove Music app stopped generating revenue for Microsoft. They kept some of the features in place to keep current Groove Music users like us happy or give us time transition to another app and service such as Spotify. Next, they stopped the Groove Music mobile app. I could no longer play my music from any device. Personally, this is when I transitioned to the Amazon Music. Now, they are removing the streaming from One Drive feature. They are getting rid of the Groove Music app by making small cuts until there will be nothing left. I really thought Microsoft's Groove Music app and service had a lot of promise when it came out. It just needed some work, but it could be something after some time and development. Like Windows Mobile, Microsoft did not want invest anymore time, money, and resources to make it work.
  • Why is anyone surprised by this? Why are many of you STILL complaining about the “lack of consumer focus”? It is blatantly obvious where MS is concentrating, and it does not include music services. Final nail in the coffin? The coffin was buried 2 years ago. Also, what is “WELP”?
  • Next MS will say they are killing Bing.
  • I can't get Groove (On windows phone) to sync w OD at all. Now I have to create a playlist right on the phone. BLAH. Was really nice to do it on my PC and all my devices had it. I'm so sick of MS I'm hoping to leave them entirely. Probably end up using Google because MS has no perseverance.
  • Screw MS! I will do my hardest to leave MS entirely. **** like this sucks!