As a big fan of background music, I was really impressed by the changes in iOS 18.4’s Control Center. There opens a new Ambient Music tab for the customizable controls of the Control Center. You can use it to add one of four pre-selected Apple Music playlists (or your own) to the Control Center, your lock screen, or an action button (provided your iPhone has one). Until now, you could play music through the Now Playing widget in the Control Center, but there were no dedicated controls to launch playlists.
This feature is different from the background sounds feature, which lets you play nature sounds on your iPhone to help you focus better. While background sounds are useful for everyone, they were initially designed as an accessibility feature, so they can be found in your iPhone’s accessibility settings. In the meantime, the new iOS 18.4 Ambient Music feature is linked to Apple Music. With this feature, you can choose one of four playlists pre-selected by Apple, or pick any Apple Music playlist of your own.
Add Apple Music playlists to the Control Center
To view these Ambient Music playlists, you’ll need to update to iOS 18.4. As of writing, it is in the developer beta stage, which is the buggiest and most unstable phase of all available Apple OS releases. Be sure to back up your data before attempting the upgrade, and don’t try it on your primary iPhone. Important apps and services can stop working at any time on beta software, so it’s crucial to be aware of the risks.
Once you have iOS 18.4 installed, you can open the Control Center, tap and hold the empty space on the screen, and tap the “Add a Control” button near the bottom of the display. Scroll down to see the tab for Ambient Music before making a selection from any one list. Apple lets you choose from four moods: Sleep, Relax, Productivity, and Health. In the Control Center, tap and hold any of these playlists to bring up more options. You can tap your library to add your own playlist to any of these controls. You can also get these handy shortcuts at your finger tips on your iPhone’s lock screen. To do this:
- lock your iPhone, and then use Touch ID or Face ID to unlock the device.
- Tap and hold on the lock screen, choose Customize, and tap the left side of the lock screen.
- Now, you can remove one of the two controls in the lower-left and lower-right corners and replace them with your playlist.
