Wake up to your favorite music with Pandora's new alarm clock
With its latest update for iOS, Pandora Radio introduces a new design and an alarm clock feature.
Waking up to the loud beeping of an alarm clock is no way to start a day, particularly if you regularly hit the snooze button and repeat the process once or twice before rolling out of bed. Pandora offers a better way. The free Pandora Radio app for iOS just received an update that introduces a new design for iOS 7 along with a long-awaited alarm clock feature.
To set the alarm, tap on the menu button in the upper-right corner when viewing the Now Playing screen. At the bottom of the menu you'll see a new line for Alarm Clock. Tap on the line to set the alarm. In addition to setting the time, you can choose the Pandora station to which you'd like to arise, the length of the snooze timer, and the volume. Tap the Done button to return to the main menu and then tap the slider button to turn the alarm on.
Two important notes: for the alarm to work, you must keep the Pandora app open to the alarm screen and your iPhone, iPad, or iPod plugged in. (Update: the alarm clock feature is not available for the iPad; a Pandora spokesperson says "we are hoping to develop this soon.") Also, you will need a network connection -- cellular or Wi-Fi -- for the alarm to work.
When the alarm goes off, you can tap the top half of the big button to turn the alarm off or the bottom half to snooze. You can also shake your iOS device to snooze. Artist and track information is displayed at the bottom of the alarm screen, and album art is displayed in the background. If Pandora wakes you up with a particularly choice track and you want to jump out of bed and keep the song playing, just tap the artist and track information. It turns off the alarm and opens whichever station you selected to wake to.
Should you want to drift off to sleep to Pandora Radio -- before waking up to its alarm clock -- learn how to set Pandora's sleep timer for mobile that was introduced earlier this year.
While the Pandora Radio app for iOS was updated today with the alarm clock feature, the Android app has not.