There are many reasons to love video games. From Final Fantasy’s sweeping adventures to Super Mario Bros’ perfect platforming formula, video games synthesize multiple artistic fields into wonderful new creations. That includes music. These are our favorite music streaming services for listening to game soundtracks, including top-notch platforms like Apple Music and Spotify.
Deeper Dive: Our Top Tested Picks
Best for Buying Songs
Apple Music
- Features more than 100 million tracks
- Cool video playlists
- 24/7 Apple Music radio stations and video channel
- Rich hi-res audio and Dolby Atmos sound
- Supports lyrics and karaoke
- Lacks a free version
- Lossless audio not available on all platforms
Featuring lossless audio, Dolby Atmos support, a 100-million song catalog, radio stations, Siri compatibility, hi-res audio, lyrics, playlists, and a 24/7 music video channel, Apple Music offers excellent bang for your buck. Even better, it lets you easily stream video game songs, including the soundtracks to Transistor and The World Ends With You.
Music buffs who favor Apple’s ecosystem. Apple Music is compatible with Apple TV, CarPlay, iPad, iPhone, and Mac, so you can easily zone out to your favorite game scores if you own an Apple device.
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Apple Music Review
Best for Streaming Soundtracks
Spotify
- Cool, AI-powered DJ
- Collaborative playlists and Group Session options
- Optional desktop app that lets you play locally stored audio files
- Premium accounts let you hear select albums before they’re released
- Student plan includes Hulu with ads
- Podcasts
- Free version
- Subscription are becoming pricey
- Still lacks hi-res audio
- Only offers lyrics to Premium subscribers
Despite fierce competition from other feature-rich streaming services, Spotify remains the king of the steaming music hill. This comes courtesy of a robust musical catalog, podcasts, collaborative playlists, and a stacked Student plan that includes Hulu and Showtime. In addition, many video game publishers, big and small, put their soundtracks on Spotify. Capcom fan? Fire up classic Devil May Cry and Street Fighter music.
Spotify hits all the right notes for a streaming music service, especially if you’re looking for video game soundtracks. Its deep podcast selection, including many gaming podcasts like The Besties and Giant Bombcast, elevates the service to a true top-shelf product. If you devour podcasts, this is the streaming service for you.
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Spotify Review
Best for Curated Playlists
Tidal
- Excellent sound quality
- Long-form editorial pieces
- Music-focused podcasts
- Exclusive backstage content, live streams, and concerts
- Lyrics
- Lacks a free listening tier
- DJ Extension is pricey
Tidal is a music streaming service that offers excellent hi-res audio, and a stellar music catalog. In a nice touch, Tidal includes thoughtful music essays, music videos, and the ability to purchase concert tickets. The curated Tidal Gaming playlists feature gaming scores, as well as tracks meant to evoke certain gaming moods.
Tidal is a great music platform for listeners who are passionate about music. If you want to read fun music writing, it has many entertaining feature stories. If you want to watch video, Tidal has music videos, video outtakes, and backstage footage. And if you’re a gamer, Tidal’s playlists can make you feel like you’ve beaten a boss or explored a vast land.
Best for Music Videos
YouTube Music
- Lets you easily switch between audio and music videos
- Many music discovery tools
- Cool location- and time-based playlists
- Can search for songs by lyrics
- Collaborative playlists
- Family and student plans
- Podcast support
- Lacks hi-res audio
- Real-time lyrics not available for every song
From Google Play Music’s ashes rose YouTube Music, a service with a fantastic blend of customized playlists, search-by-lyrics functionality, and official studio releases. What’s more, as an extension of YouTube’s massive entertainment branch, there is an eclectic selection of unique music, including official and community-uploaded video game soundtracks.
YouTube is a tremendously popular platform, so hopping on to YouTube Music for your listening entertainment is no real stretch. Likewise, former Google Play Music fans should find plenty of similarities (and a lot to love) between YouTube Music and the now-defunct service.
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YouTube Music Review
Best for Fan Covers
Amazon Music Unlimited
- Large music and video library
- Cool AI-generated playlists
- Karaoke-style lyrics
- Supports hi-res audio
- Tight integration with Amazon device family
- Ad-supported free tier
- Lengthy 90-day free trial
- Lacks live radio
- Paltry discount for Prime members
Amazon is an online giant in both the e-commerce and digital streaming fields. It’s no surprise then that Amazon Music Unlimited offers a feature-packed listening experience that has earned the company a spot among the best in the field, with its 90-million song catalog, hi-res audio, and podcast library. Here you’ll find many fan covers of popular gaming songs alongside official releases.
If you want to stream the Bugsnax theme song or the Hades soundtrack, Amazon’s got you covered. The service is also great for people who are part of the Amazon ecosystem. You can stream crisp audio via a smartphone app, web browser, or numerous Amazon devices, including Echo speakers and Fire TVs.
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Amazon Music Unlimited Review
Best for Streaming Nintendo Music
Nintendo Music
- Enables online multiplayer and cloud saves
- NES, SNES, and Game Boy classic game library
- Includes the Nintendo Music streaming service
- Exclusive F-Zero 99, Pac-Man 99, and Tetris 99 titles
- Inexpensive
- Requires a phone for voice chat
- Cloud saves don’t work with all games
- Notable holes in game and music libraries
While rival companies put soundtracks on other services, Nintendo created its own platform, Nintendo Music, for official access to soundtracks from Animal Crossing, Mario, Pokémon, Zelda, and other game series. Along with its impressive, expanding library, the Nintendo Music mobile app has intriguing features, such as hiding songs that spoil gameplay surprises or searching for specific consoles.
Nintendo Music is for Nintendo fans. You can’t even access it unless you subscribe to the Nintendo Switch Online service. It’s not meant to directly compete with more comprehensive music streaming services, but instead dominate its specific video game soundtrack niche. And as essentially a bonus add-on, it does a good job.
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Nintendo Music Review
Buying Guide: The Best Streaming Music Services for Video Game Soundtracks
The Many Video Game Music Streaming Options
Video game music can be just as catchy, complex, and moving as tunes from other media, and the music industry has started to recognize this. The 2023 Grammys gave out their first ever award for “Best Score Soundtrack For Video Games/Interactive Media” and Assassin’s Creed Valhalla took home the inaugural prize. Video games have been around for decades, so there’s a lot of music to enjoy. Fortunately, the best streaming music services offer vast song libraries from countless sources, including video game soundtracks.
Spotify remains the biggest name in streaming music, and video game publishers are starting to notice. It’s becoming increasingly common for big publishers to dump their entire video game soundtrack catalogs onto the service. Do you fancy RPGs? Let Persona’s bangers into your heart. Prefer live recordings? Video Games Live, a concert series that performs orchestral versions of video game compositions, has plenty of music available for streaming, too.
Tidal delivers high-quality audio approved by the biggest artists to separate itself from Spotify. So, I didn’t expect to find any video game music. However, the service offers the surprising Tidal Gaming. These curated playlists collect songs meant to evoke certain video game feelings, such as defeating a boss or roaming an open world. These works come from video game soundtracks, such as Halo and Assassin’s Creed. Others are just dope songs from cool musicians, like Steve Aoki, The Glitch Mob, and Kendrick Lamar.
(Credit: Spotify)
Amazon Music and Apple Music’s streaming, video game music collections aren’t as big as their rivals’ catalogs, but you’ll find the familiar soundtrack or two. More often than not, you’ll discover fan covers of famous game songs rather than official releases. On the upside, these tech powerhouses have their own storefronts where you can opt to buy digital tracks. So, if you don’t want to pony up for a monthly music subscription, you permanently purchase tracks from Bugsnax, Hades, Transistor, The World Ends With You, and other video game soundtracks. When you buy these digital downloads, you’ll gain the option to stream them and sync them with your cloud library.
YouTube Music is a fine streaming service that’s a treasure trove of video game music. You can find practically any song, sometimes looped for hours on end. This raises some iffy copyright questions. Publishers often take down big channels dedicated to video game music, especially when the tracks are clearly ripped from pirated copies of games not yet on sale. Still, when you need to hear a specific video game song fast, you can’t beat YouTube Music.
(Credit: Tidal)
Other Places to Find Video Game Music
Many games let you listen to their scores inside the game itself as a bonus feature. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate takes this concept and runs with it so far that it deserves a mention, despite not being a dedicated music platform.
This massive crossover fighting game includes more than a thousand songs, including original tracks and remixes, pulled from the world-famous gaming franchises on display. Fatal Fury. The Legend of Zelda. Minecraft. Sonic the Hedgehog. There are more than 24 hours’ worth of incredible tracks. In fact, Smash’s music player lets you turn off the Switch’s screen to save battery and use the console as a music box.
For more Nintendo tunes, a subscription to Nintendo Switch Online now grants access to Nintendo Music, a dedicated mobile app for listening to new and classic game soundtracks. The service receives new albums weekly and includes helpful functions like searching for boss battle themes or extending tracks for longer repeated listening. There’s no way to access Nintendo Music as a standalone service, you must pay for Nintendo Switch Online to receive it.
Other games and devices turn music itself into a playground. Fuser lets you mash up songs into imaginative new creations, as does the beautiful, dark, twisted, fleshy fantasy: the Stem Player.
Recommended by Our Editors
Play It Again
Video game music is a genre unto itself. Before developers could record epic, orchestral arrangements and pack them onto discs, video game music was limited to the relatively simple sounds that retro consoles could produce. Talented composers spent years turning technological beeps and boops into masterful melodies that resonate with us today. In fact, contemporary musicians, from Anamanaguchi to Vektroid, use new technology to write songs in the vein of classic video game tracks.
Nowadays, it’s easier than ever to enjoy game music, as you no longer need to pick up a controller to zone out to gaming tunes. With these excellent music services, you can stream your favorite video game song or album to a PC or mobile device.
For more, check out The 25 Best Video Game Soundtracks Ever.
