The delayed collaborative Apple Music playlist surfaces in iOS 17.3 beta 1

Worried about abuse and spam, Apple removed the collaborative Apple Music playlist feature from iOS 17.2. With the collaborative playlist, friends and family members can make changes to your playlist including the addition/deletion of songs, and the reordering of the list. In “Now Playing,” the same friends and family members can react to a particular song using an emoji. Apple reportedly pushed back the release of the feature to an unknown date next year.

The collaborative Apple Music playlist still might not be available to all iPhone users with an eligible device until 2024 when the final version of iOS 17.3 is released. But for those who install iOS 17.3 beta 1, the feature is available now. Whether Apple keeps the collaborative Apple Music playlist on the final version of the update is unknown. Heck, Apple could even decide to remove it from iOS 17.3 beta 2.

By default, only the person who created the playlist, which is the device owner, will be able to add songs to the playlist. However, the feature will allow the device owner to make a change in settings that will allow others to decide what the tunes on the playlist should be and in which order they should play. And if someone out there is sick of a particular tune on the playlist, it can be removed.

Still, if you’d like to check it out while you can now, you can join the Apple Beta Program by going to beta.apple.com, or by clicking on this link. Sign up for the Beta program and once you do, go to Settings > General > Software Update and you’ll see a line on top of the screen for Beta Updates. Tap on that line and press on iOS 17 public beta to receive the update.

Keep in mind that beta releases are not stable and if a feature you need every day is affected, you might have to erase the beta which will wipe your phone. If you have a backup saved, you can get your data back by installing the backup. Frankly, if having the collaborative Apple Music playlist is not important to you, you might as well wait to see if it survives to the final version of iOS 17.3 which will probably be sometime next month.