Pandora (service) facts for kids
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| Type of business | Subsidiary |
|---|---|
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Type of site
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Music streaming service |
| Available in | English |
| Founded | January 2000 (as Savage Beast Technologies) Oakland, California, U.S. |
| Headquarters | Oakland, California, U.S. |
| No. of locations | 7 |
| Area served | United States |
| Founder(s) | Will Glaser Jon Kraft Tim Westergren |
| Services | Internet radio |
| Employees | 1,938 (2019) |
| Parent | Sirius XM (2019–present) |
| Subsidiaries | Rdio (as of December 22, 2015) Next Big Sound (as of November 1, 2021) |
| Advertising | Banner ads, video ads, audio ads |
| Registration | Optional (required to save stations) |
| Users | 55.9 million active (2021), 6.4 million subscribers (2021) |
| Current status | Active |
| Native client(s) on | Universal Windows App, iOS, Android |
| Written in | Java |
Pandora is a popular music streaming service that lets you listen to songs and create your own radio stations. It is owned by a company called Sirius XM and is based in Oakland, California, in the United States.
Pandora is special because it uses something called the "Music Genome Project". This project helps Pandora understand music by looking at its different parts. It checks things like the type of music (genre) and the instruments used. This helps Pandora recommend new songs you might like.
When Pandora first started, it was like a personalized internet radio station. You could create stations based on your favorite songs or artists. Today, you can use Pandora for free with ads, or pay for a version with no ads and more features. In 2017, Pandora also launched "Pandora Premium," which lets you pick and play any song you want, just like other music services.
Contents
About Pandora
How Pandora Started
Pandora began in 2000. It was first called Savage Beast Technologies. The founders were Will Glaser, Jon Kraft, and Tim Westergren. Will Glaser had the idea to sort music by its different features. He called this the "Music Genome Project".
At first, the company wanted to help stores recommend music to their customers. But then they changed their plan. In 2005, they decided to focus on people like you! That's when Pandora launched as an internet radio service.
Free and Paid Options
Pandora offers a "freemium" service. This means you can use basic features for free. The free version has advertisements or some limits. If you want more features, like better sound quality or listening offline, you can pay for a subscription.
Who Owns Pandora Now
In 2019, a big company called Sirius XM bought Pandora. They paid about $3.5 billion for it. Pandora is still very popular. In 2021, it had almost 56 million active users each month. About 6.4 million of those users paid for a subscription.
Pandora's Journey
Early Days of Pandora
After changing its focus, Pandora officially launched in September 2005. At first, it was only a paid service. But soon, they added a free version that had ads. This happened after they noticed people were using free trials over and over again.
Growing Bigger
Pandora grew very fast. In 2011, it became a public company. This meant people could buy shares of the company. At that time, Pandora had 80 million users. It had a huge library of 800,000 songs.
By 2013, Pandora had 200 million users! It was a huge part of internet radio listening in the United States. In 2014, Pandora had over 1.5 million songs in its library.
In 2016, Pandora launched "Pandora Plus." This was a new subscription service. It offered more features for a monthly fee. Later, in 2017, Pandora launched "Pandora Premium." This allowed users to pick specific songs to play, just like other popular streaming services.
Pandora also started to focus on podcasts. They wanted to help people discover podcasts just like they discover music. In 2019, Pandora's parent company, Sirius XM, even partnered with Marvel. They planned to launch superhero podcasts!
Buying Other Companies
Pandora has also bought other companies. In 2015, they bought parts of another music streaming service called Rdio. This helped them get more employees and licenses for music.
In 2018, Pandora bought AdsWizz. This company helps with digital audio ads. This helped Pandora improve how it sells advertisements. In 2020, Sirius XM also bought Stitcher, a company known for its podcasts. Stitcher's podcasts were then added to Pandora.
How Pandora Works
Streaming Music
When you use Pandora, you can listen to stations based on music types. You can also listen to stations made by other users. Or, you can create your own station based on your favorite songs or artists.
To help Pandora learn what you like, you can use "thumbs up" and "thumbs down" buttons. A "thumbs up" means you like the song. Pandora will then play more songs like it. A "thumbs down" means you don't like it. Pandora will skip that song and play fewer songs like it. If you give two "thumbs down" to the same artist, Pandora will stop playing that artist on that station.
Pandora looks at over 450 musical details to pick the next song. These details include things like how fast the rhythm is or the type of singing.
Different Ways to Listen
Pandora has a free version with ads. It also has "Pandora Plus," which is a paid subscription. Pandora Plus lets you listen offline and gives you more skips and replays.
In 2017, "Pandora Premium" was launched. This is another paid option. It lets you pick and play any song you want. You can also create your own playlists. Pandora Premium uses smart technology to help you find new songs and avoid low-quality tracks.
In 2019, Pandora added full song credits to its app. This means you can see who helped make each song.
Listening Limits
Sometimes, Pandora has limits on how much free music you can listen to. For example, in 2013, there was a 40-hour-per-month limit for free mobile listening. But this limit was removed later that year.
In 2016, Pandora added a rewind button. This lets you play a song again. It also allowed users to skip more songs per hour if they watched an ad. Before that, you could only skip six songs in an hour.
Where You Can Use Pandora
Pandora has apps for many devices. You can use it on Android phones and iOS devices like iPhones and iPads. There are also apps for Apple Watch and Wear OS smartwatches. Pandora can also connect to smart speakers. In 2019, you could start using your voice to control the Pandora app on your phone.
How Pandora Makes Money
Pandora makes money in a few ways. Most of its money comes from advertising. When you use the free version, you hear or see ads. The other way Pandora makes money is from people who pay for subscriptions like Pandora Plus or Pandora Premium.
Pandora tries to show you ads that you might find interesting. They do this by looking at what you do online. This is called "targeted advertising." But you can choose to turn off targeted ads if you want.
Pandora also works with companies that make electronics. This helps Pandora's technology be built into things like smart TVs and speakers.
See also
- List of Internet radio stations
- List of online music databases
- List of streaming media systems
