TikTok has been constantly experimenting with new features to help users get the most out of the platform. Now, it looks like the short-video platform giant is rolling out a new feature called “Sound Search” that allows you to search for the songs you love. TikTok’s Sound Search is very similar to Google’s hum-to-search feature that allows you to sing, hum, or play a tune to search for a particular song.
TikTok’s Sound Search feature lets you search for a song by singing, humming, or playing it
By now you must be wondering what’s so different about TikTok’s Sound Search. And, how does it exactly work? Let’s say there’s one particular song that stuck in your head, and you can’t remember the lyrics of it. But, all you know is the tune.
To search for the specific song, you’ll need to open the TikTok app and tap the microphone icon available in the search bar. Next, you can select the “Sound Search” option and start humming the tune of the song you’re looking for. Besides humming, you can also sing the song or play it to search for it within the TikTok app.
As TechCrunch notes, TikTok’s Sound Search feature has shown promising results in recognizing some popular songs. While the feature is designed to recognize songs, a few users have hinted that it can identify popular TikTok sounds too.
The new feature doubles up as a video discovery tool, too
It is worth mentioning that TikTok’s Sound Search is not just limited to identifying songs. It doubles up as a video search tool as well. When you sing or hum to find a song, TikTok’s new tool also displays relevant videos featuring the song. This also means you can access a vast collection of TikTok videos featuring your favorite song. And, that’s what makes TikTok’s Sound Search different, or rather better than the song-only identifier feature on Shazam and YouTube Music.
That said, TikTok’s new feature that lets you sing and hum isn’t that handy with not-so-popular songs. Although it could identify lesser-known songs in some cases, it fails to display the related videos featuring the song.
All that said, songs undoubtedly remain an integral part of TikTok which is why the new tool has immense potential. TikTok is reportedly testing the feature in a few regions and is currently not available for every user. Moreover, there’s no word on when it will release the feature for all the users.
