Integrating Music Services

[WiiM Team]

Hi, we'd like to see what music services you want integrated into our WiiM Home app.

Please note, we hear you on Apple Music and YouTube Music as those are two we would love to integrate, but aside from these two, please post which ones you'd like to see and please vote up the ones you want. We are curious about what our community wants, and we'll see what we can do!

--
2/13/24 - We closed this thread and want to move the conversation to this thread where there is a poll. https://forum.wiimhome.com/threads/integrating-music-services-poll.2816/

Thanks!
WiiM Team

 

[Brantome]

Eversolo has Apple Music so my request is Apple Music integrated to wiiim app.

No. Eversolo achieve that by running a modded version of Android so are in effect running the standard Apple Music app but thru amended audio drivers on Android. WiiM write custom Linux based firmware and can’t run android apps.
Plus the difficulties of using Airplay 2 to cast Apple Music have been discussed often on the group - the best you get is lossy AAC.

 

[halk]

Yandex Music

 

[dindan306]

+1 for SomaFM and Plex/Plexamp

 

[timmo]

Hi Benno,

Please group multiple WiiM Pro devices with your Google Home App. Then you can cast the SiriusXM to this group. Please let us know if it works for you. Thank you!

I finally tried this and it works. I never use the Google Home app (it’s ugly ), but I setup my 3 WiiMs (2 Pros, 1 Pro Plus) as a Speaker Group in the Home app, and then in the SiriusXM app was able to see that Chromecast Speaker Group to cast directly. Works well … I can see what’s playing in the WiiM app for each WiiM unit and also in the Home app to control the zone. Seems to work much better this way than AirPlay as AirPlay will eventually stop playing because the device you cast from eventually loses its connection to stream (in my experience anyways). I’m hoping this works well and doesn’t drop as SiriusXM will only allow 1 stream (the service is extremely sensitive in this regard). Need to test this more.

Looking forward to built-in integration of SiriusXM though! … but this is a good workaround for now.

Since Chromecast devices can’t be grouped together in Roon, I believe I can also use Roon in this same way with choosing this Chromecast Speaker Group (per my Googling) until the WiiM Pro Plus finally gets certified ‘Roon Ready’, as AirPlay does not work well in my home. Will test when i get back home.

 

[Arco_23]

ReListen please!

 

[Aquarius]

+1 for SomaFM and Plex/Plexamp

Plex/Plexamp works perfectly to the Pro and Pro Plus since they have Chromecast

 

[ihearurdog]

Plex/Plexamp works perfectly to the Pro and Pro Plus since they have Chromecast

Chromecast doesn’t support gapless playback, so albums that flow don’t work and crossfades don’t work (Plexamp "sweet fades” are really pretty good). It’s also not possible to setup the WiiM remote to launch a Plex playlist. There are similar, though more bearable for me, issues with using Airplay.

 

[Doublej]

I cannot believe no one has mentioned Wolgang's Music. It is phenomenal and free!

Wolfgang's Music Apps

Stream the world's greatest collection of live recordings through our free music app. Listen to artists from all genres, from the 1950s to last week.

www.wolfgangs.com

 

[Benno]

I finally tried this and it works. I never use the Google Home app (it’s ugly ), but I setup my 3 WiiMs (2 Pros, 1 Pro Plus) as a Speaker Group in the Home app, and then in the SiriusXM app was able to see that Chromecast Speaker Group to cast directly. Works well … I can see what’s playing in the WiiM app for each WiiM unit and also in the Home app to control the zone. Seems to work much better this way than AirPlay as AirPlay will eventually stop playing because the device you cast from eventually loses its connection to stream (in my experience anyways). I’m hoping this works well and doesn’t drop as SiriusXM will only allow 1 stream (the service is extremely sensitive in this regard). Need to test this more.

Looking forward to built-in integration of SiriusXM though! … but this is a good workaround for now.

Since Chromecast devices can’t be grouped together in Roon, I believe I can also use Roon in this same way with choosing this Chromecast Speaker Group (per my Googling) until the WiiM Pro Plus finally gets certified ‘Roon Ready’, as AirPlay does not work well in my home. Will test when i get back home.

I took another look at the Google Home App. It isn't exactly intuitive on how you cast to multiple zones ... you have to click on the speaker you are currently casting to and then it opens up to show all available devices. So you can then select another wiim (zone) to cast to.

This is done by -
>>>at the bottom of the Google Home App, while on favorites tab
>>>there is a bottom bar showing zone/content playing
>>> click on that
>>> this opens new screen (a "Now Playing' screen)
>>> then at bottom it shows zones playing
>>> click on that
>>> opens other wiims/devices and then you can select to cast to those (or unselect).

Maybe everyone with an android knew this... but I didn't.

This works very similar to the Airplay setup as I recall.

The only downside I will say is that the Google Home App shows the select streaming app at the top of the now playing screen (i.e. iHeart or SiriusXM), however, when you click on that icon, it just says "couldn't open the app". Seems like this is a Google Home App Problem though. Additionally, changing the channel in the native iHeart or SiriusXM app doesn't always work and sometimes requires restarting the casting process.

So not a perfect process, but acceptable once you educate everyone in the household on how to do this.

 

[timmo]

In the Google Home app (which I really really really hate ), you just need to create a Speaker Group once and it will always be there to cast to from wherever (SiriusXM app, Roon, etc.). It stays permanent once setup (and I agree that it’s not intuitive to setup):

In iOS:
-Google Home app
-Settings / Devices, groups & rooms
-Speaker Groups
-Create speaker group

Maybe iOS and Android are a bit different? In any event, that Speaker Group is always present for me to cast to from apps that support it (very handy).

 

[Mr Ee]

I took another look at the Google Home App. It isn't exactly intuitive on how you cast to multiple zones ... you have to click on the speaker you are currently casting to and then it opens up to show all available devices. So you can then select another wiim (zone) to cast to.

This is done by -
>>>at the bottom of the Google Home App, while on favorites tab
>>>there is a bottom bar showing zone/content playing
>>> click on that
>>> this opens new screen (a "Now Playing' screen)
>>> then at bottom it shows zones playing
>>> click on that
>>> opens other wiims/devices and then you can select to cast to those (or unselect).

Maybe everyone with an android knew this... but I didn't.

This works very similar to the Airplay setup as I recall.

The only downside I will say is that the Google Home App shows the select streaming app at the top of the now playing screen (i.e. iHeart or SiriusXM), however, when you click on that icon, it just says "couldn't open the app". Seems like this is a Google Home App Problem though. Additionally, changing the channel in the native iHeart or SiriusXM app doesn't always work and sometimes requires restarting the casting process.

So not a perfect process, but acceptable once you educate everyone in the household on how to do this.

You can create groups of devices, then cast to a specific group name.

Edit: I only saw Timmo's reply after I'd posted!
I went off to do something else halfway through typing...

 

[Benno]

In the Google Home app (which I really really really hate ), you just need to create a Speaker Group once and it will always be there to cast to from wherever (SiriusXM app, Roon, etc.). It stays permanent once setup (and I agree that it’s not intuitive to setup):

In iOS:
-Google Home app
-Settings / Devices, groups & rooms
-Speaker Groups
-Create speaker group

Maybe iOS and Android are a bit different? In any event, that Speaker Group is always present for me to cast to from apps that support it (very handy).

Hi Timmo and Mr. Ee - agree with you about the speaker groups.

The issue that I find is that I have 8 Wiim's (one for each room/zone). It's hard to preconfigure a speaker group for each scenario/combo that I might want at a particular time. That's why I originally stopped using it... I didn't want to have to re configure groups all the time or have 20 different groups for different room/zone combinations.

But what I see now is that I can do a couple speaker groups for the most common scenarios and then use the method I mentioned above to tweak the zones I want on at that particular time.... i.e. I have a group for "Kitchen-Living Room" now .... I turn that on, but then say I want to go out on the back deck for a while... so even thought I don't have a speaker group for those 3 zones, I can simply go into the Google Home App, on the "Now Playing" screen, select the group playing at the bottom ("Kitchen-Living Room") and then tick the circle to add the "Deck" then I have those 3 zones all playing.

The more I use the Google Home App, the more I like it when chromecasting from the native music app (i.e. iHeart or SiriusXM). I suspect I'll use the Wiim app less and less. I do think that there could be improvements to the Google Home App, like how volume is controlled at low levels, working link to the music app, etc). But I feel this opens up a whole new world of using a multitude of unsupported Wiim source music apps with multiple wiims.

Appreciate this discussion on here ... hopefully this helps anyone else that may have struggled with this the way I had

 

[darkstar]

The ability to play to other UPnP renderers would be amazing. It would allow, for instance, playing to HQPlayer Embedded for upsampling. Also support for squeeze player / LMS would be fantastic. Thanks!

 

[Brantome]

The ability to play to other UPnP renderers would be amazing. It would allow, for instance, playing to HQPlayer Embedded for upsampling. Also support for squeeze player / LMS would be fantastic. Thanks!

Apart from the Mini, WiiM devices already have a Squeezelite client and can be played to from LMS, or do you mean the other way round?

 

[SpacePilot3000]

No. Eversolo achieve that by running a modded version of Android so are in effect running the standard Apple Music app but thru amended audio drivers on Android. WiiM write custom Linux based firmware and can’t run android apps.
Plus the difficulties of using Airplay 2 to cast Apple Music have been discussed often on the group - the best you get is lossy AAC.

agree, but there are many unofficial Apple Music players which means you can integrate AM with Wiim app (at least in theory).

 

[Brantome]

agree, but there are many unofficial Apple Music players which means you can integrate AM with Wiim app (at least in theory).

How does integrating it with the WiiM app help - it would need to be integrated with the WiiM firmware which is another matter entirely.

 

[SpacePilot3000]

did Amazon/Tidal integration required firmware changes?

 

[Brantome]

did Amazon/Tidal integration required firmware changes?

Yes. The WiiM firmware is where all the smarts are - the WiiM app is just a window on to that.

 

[JP’wiimpro]

Hi, we'd like to see what music services you want integrated into our WiiM Home app.

Please note, we hear you on Apple Music and YouTube Music as those are two we would love to integrate, but aside from these two, please post which ones you'd like to see and please vote up the ones you want. We are curious about what our community wants, and we'll see what we can do!

Hello i would integrate Apple Music on wifi .How to do This ?

 

[Brantome]

Hello i would integrate Apple Music on wifi .How to do This ?

Best you can do with Apple Music is use its app and airplay to your WiiM device but that’ll only be in lossy AAC due to widely documented Apple/ Airplay 2 constraints.