What happens to Apple Music accounts when the owner dies

Apple states that after an Apple Music subscription expires, the account can no longer play songs from the Apple Music catalog, and any playlists added from the catalog or built using catalog music are no longer available. Sync Library turns off when the subscription expires, and the Additional Apple Music Terms state that "when your Apple Music membership ends, you will lose access to your iCloud Music Library, including iCloud Music Library Content that is uploaded to iCloud Music Library servers." Music and playlists held on the device before subscribing remain.

Yes, in one respect and not in another. Purchased music does not end when the membership ends — it is a separate, licensed asset rather than catalog access. But Apple publishes no mechanism to transfer it either. Purchased music is Content under the Apple Media Services Terms, which limit use to "personal, noncommercial purposes" and state that "no portion of the Content or Services may be transferred or reproduced in any form or by any means, except as expressly permitted by this Agreement," and Apple lists purchased music among the data a Legacy Contact cannot access. While the account holder is alive, a Family Sharing group with Purchase Sharing on can reach "Music from the iTunes Store" a member bought; Apple documents no equivalent after death.

No. Apple's page on the data a Legacy Contact can access names four excluded categories: purchased content such as movies, music, and books; subscriptions and in-app purchases; payment information for Apple Account or Apple Pay; and information stored in iCloud Keychain. A Legacy Contact reaches iCloud-stored data such as photos, messages, notes, files, and device backups. The Apple Music membership and any purchased songs sit outside that pathway.

The Media Services Terms state that Subscriptions "automatically renew until cancelled in the Manage Subscriptions section of your account settings," so the charge continues until it is stopped. Apple documents identifying the billing Apple Account by searching the deceased's email for "receipt from Apple" or "invoice from Apple." Cancellation of an Apple-billed subscription is performed from within the account settings of the Apple Account on that receipt — Apple states that "you can't cancel a family member's subscription." Apple publishes no self-service executor cancellation, so where the estate cannot use those routes the channel is Apple Support billing. If the deceased was billed through Google Play on an Android device, or through a wireless carrier or other reseller, Apple directs the cancellation to that biller rather than to Apple.

Apple publishes nothing specific about a deceased Family Sharing organizer, so no outcome is asserted here. What Apple does publish is that a member who leaves a family group "won't have access to any services shared by your family, such as an Apple Music family subscription or a shared iCloud+ plan," that the organizer is the one billed for the plan, and that the iCloud Terms terminate account rights at death and allow the account to be terminated on receipt of a death certificate. The practical consequence for a family whose plan ran on the deceased's account is that the shared subscription ends with it, and each family member can take out their own subscription under their own Apple Account.

Apple maintains a purchase history for every Apple Account and documents it at reportaproblem.apple.com and, on a signed-in device, under Apps & Purchase History in the App Store, and its billing receipts are emailed and searchable in the deceased's own mail. Apple also states that hiding an item does not remove its record from purchase history. Apple publishes no executor-facing route that produces that history on request, so an estate letter asks for it as a discretionary disclosure. A list of purchased songs is an inventory record; it does not make the songs transferable.