A couple of months ago, many of those watching the music streaming space were asking themselves the same question: will Apple Music be good enough to make me cancel my Spotify account?

This author's answer to that question is, frankly, "no".

Apple may have won the PR war by securing the rights to stream Taylor Swift's latest album 1989 after appeasing her on artist royalties, but at the end of the day Apple Music has failed to offer more – arguably, it offers less – than what other services were doing already.

The three major players reviewed here (Apple Music, Spotify and Google Play Music) have plenty in common: $11.99 a month gets you ad-free access to "30 million-plus" songs; curated playlists; "radio stations" which play songs in the style of a particular artist, song or genre; and various personalisation and recommendation features. Each also service allows you to save tracks to your personal library to listen to later without blowing all your data.

But when it comes to user experience and how well these services deliver what they promise, not all are created equal.

Apple Music

Price: Premium subscription $11.99 a month (90-day free trial); family subscription (up to six members) $17.99 a month; Beats 1 radio, ad-supported listening free.
Quality: Variable rate, averaging 256kbps.
Data consumption: 115MB for one hour of streaming based on average rate. Also has offline mode.
Current deals: Free 12-month subscription on a Telstra Go Mobile Plan for iPhone, excluding data charges.
Best feature: Beats 1 adds something different.
Worst feature: There are more than one; read on.

Apple differentiated its music streaming service with Beats 1, a global radio station with some big names behind it (Zane Lowe, Josh Homme, Trent Reznor). It's a good mix of the popular and the new and interesting, and may in time prove a good branding exercise.

But it's a free service that isn't integral to Apple Music, so it's problematic to view it as a value add.

And, despite the posturing, it's just a radio station. Apple isn't reinventing the wheel here, folks.

Apple Music's clunky user interface has been well documented elsewhere, so I won't go into too much detail here, but suffice to say Google Play Music and Spotify are miles more intuitive and easy to use. The Apple Music desktop app is particularly tricky; essentially, it's still iTunes, but with new features weirdly slotted in beside the old, with confusing results.

In terms of curation and personalisation, I found Apple Music underwhelming. The novelty of choosing which bands and genres you like by tapping on these weird bubble things seems to be nothing more than a distraction from the fact that its recommendation system lags behind the competition.

Unadventurous: Apple Music asks you to select from some limited styles, then serves the same thing back to you. Photo: Screenshot

The list of genres and artists offered is very limited – no "soul" option? – and once it has that information, it makes some curious decisions. Why ask if I like Loretta Lynn, only to show me a playlist called "Intro to Loretta Lynn", as if I've never listened to her before?

Some have noted Apple Music simply takes a little time to improve its recommendations once you've "liked" or "disliked" a few tracks. But it only takes Spotify a couple of hours of listening to serve you up great suggestions based on your tastes.

Creating a radio station in Apple Music based on a favourite track also throws up some jarring songs. I was played slick and boring live tracks from Irma Thomas' later years when I specifically fed it some classic, warm '60s soul.

Overall, Apple Music's recommendations, playlists and radio stations are unadventurous, geared towards the popular and obvious. That may satisfy casual listeners but there's little here to keep serious music aficionados interested.

Verdict: Unless you're well and truly wedded to Apple's ecosystem, you may be better off searching for kicks elsewhere.

Spotify

Price: Premium subscription $11.99 a month (60-day free trial); family subscription $17.99 to $35.99, up to five listeners; limited, ad-supported tier free.
Quality: Premium users can choose 160kbps or 320kbps. Free tier users can choose 96kbps or 160kbps.
Data consumption: 144MB an hour at 320kbps; 72MB an hour at 160kbps; 43MB an hour at 96kbps. Also has offline mode.
Current deals: Up to 12 months' free subscription on selected Vodafone Red plans.
Best features: User-generated playlists; "Discover Weekly" recommendations.
Worst feature: It's not a "worst", exactly, but I'm not blown away by Spotify's "radio" algorithms.

Spotify has the slickest user interface of the three, with its classic black background, plenty of ways to browse, and easy navigation. It also does clever things like turning your smartphone into a remote so you can can plug your computer into some big ol' speakers and play DJ from the other room.

Much thought has gone into its curated playlists, including some localised lists from the Spotify Australia team, which keeps an eye on local trends and up-and-coming acts. The best curated playlists are geared towards the young, hip and new; they become a bit less interesting once you go further back in music history. But there are endless user playlists to browse too, which offer more diversity.

On trend: Browsing Spotify's curated playlists. Photo: Screenshot

Spotify's Discover Weekly feature serves up a fresh batch of albums once a week chosen especially for you. As one friend put it, it "knows my music taste better than I do". There are forgotten favourites and undiscovered gems, and users are invited to listen to whole albums rather than trending songs.

Verdict: If you're a music fanatic who prefers to explore artists album by album, this one is for you.

Google Play Music

Price: Premium subscription $11.99 a month (30-day free trial); store 50,000 of your own songs in the cloud for free.
Quality: Adjusts depending on internet connection, up to 320kbps.
Data consumption: Up to 144MB an hour. Also has offline mode.
Current deals: Free 90-day trial with a Chromecast purchase.
Best features: The revamped playlists are a joy to browse; "I'm feeling lucky" radio is a winner.
Worst features: Recommendation features are hit and miss; user interface can be annoying.

Easy listening: Google Play Music's revamped radio stations make browsing a joy. Photo: Screenshot

Google Play Music's recently revamped radio stations feature is a lot of fun. It lets you pick from a list of situations which vary depending on the time of day – with music to stay in bed to, or to listen to while commuting or cooking dinner – and then choose a sub-genre before it serves you up a specific selection of themed stations. It's a musical choose-your-own-adventure, with an invariably interesting ending.

This is my pick of the bunch when it comes to creating a station based on a song or artist. The app matches styles perfectly while still keeping things interesting. Perhaps best of all is its "I'm Feeling Lucky" radio station, which plays an endless supply of tunes based on your listening tastes, not just one song or artist.

I like the simplicity of Google Play Music's interface but it can be frustrating at times – like when it cuts track titles short.

There's also no separate desktop app, just a web player.

Featuring Jimmy who?: Google Play Music's interface is clean but sometimes frustrating. Photo: Screenshot

Where Google Play Music falls short, however, is its "Recommended for You" section. I've been listening to the service for months and it should know by now that I'm never going to click on Meghan Trainor's latest album, or Ed Sheeran Radio.

Verdict: The best of the bunch for when you don't know what you want to listen to.

Correction: This article has been updated to include the correct figures for data consumption per hour of streaming for each service.