SoundCloud has unveiled a complete redesign which promises to make it as easy to create and share sound as it already is for photos, videos and text. The new service – dubbed the Next SoundCloud – is being introduced first through private beta invites and then through phased rollouts to its community over the next few months.
The Berlin-based company, which is one of the most successful and best-known startups originating from the German capital, allows users to upload and share any kind of sounds. It was also revealed at Wednesday’s press event in San Francisco that another user milestone has been reached.
Co-founder and CEO Alex Ljung said: “Over the past few years we’ve been championing the need to unmute the web and have signed up over 15 million sound creators in the process.”
He added that Next SoundCloud “delivers a simpler, faster, more social sound platform to help everyone appreciate sound more.”
CTO and fellow co-founder Eric Wahlforss said: “Next SoundCloud has been re-engineered from the inside out, It’s much more than an aesthetic change. By making use of state of the art technologies available in the latest generation browsers, we’ve created a technology platform that enables us to provide a much better user experience and develop new features faster.”
The app-like new look includes a more interactive waveform player, new reposts for users to share what they hear, a continuous play functionality and easier navigation.
It’s less than four months since SoundCloud hit the five million user mark, and earlier on Wednesday, David Noël, head of SoundCloud’s community team, was speaking on a startup panel at the NEXT conference in Berlin. While he made no mention of the upcoming announcement, he did reveal part of what drives the company’s army of users: “SoundCloud is made up of this huge community of sound creators, so you have the motivation of creating something and sharing it if you want to bring it to the world.”