A PartyTime Alternative That Puts the Party on Your TV

Updated August 2026 · 4 min read

PartyTime and Jukebox are close cousins. Both are free iPhone apps, both play Apple Music, and both let your guests vote on what plays next from their own phones without installing anything. If you are choosing between them, the decision comes down to a handful of things one does and the other does not.

The short answer

PartyTime is a free digital jukebox for iPhone built on Apple Music, and it does the core job. Jukebox does the same core job and adds a free Apple TV app, joining with no code, group skip voting, synced lyrics, and a recap everyone sees when the night ends.

Side by side

The Apple TV app is the real gap

No other app in this category has one. Jukebox has a proper tvOS app showing what is playing, the queue with live vote counts, time-synced lyrics, and a join QR the room can scan without getting up.

What makes it work is what it does not do: it never touches your audio. The music keeps playing from the host's phone, so it reaches whatever speakers you already use. Screen mirroring an app to a TV hijacks the audio route and pushes sound to the TV — this is a separate app on the Apple TV, so it only draws the screen.

Nobody wants to type a code

Both apps let guests scan a QR code or type a 6-digit code. Jukebox adds a third route: guests who are simply nearby join with no code at all. It sounds small until you have watched ten people squint at a phone screen trying to read six digits across a dark room.

Skipping, not just queuing

Voting on what comes next only solves half of it. The other half is the song playing right now that the room has quietly turned against. Jukebox lets guests vote to skip, so it takes a group to move on rather than one person grabbing the phone.

What happens when the party ends

When a Jukebox party finishes, everyone who was there sees a recap: how many songs played, how many votes were cast, which songs won and whose picks the room actually wanted. It can be shared as an image, which is usually the moment people ask what app you were using.

Where PartyTime might suit you

If all you want is a straightforward free voting jukebox and you have no interest in a TV screen, PartyTime covers that and is free to try. Both apps need the host to have Apple Music, so neither is an option if your library lives elsewhere.

Frequently asked questions