Following are some of the best free music download softwares and are listed on the basis of their popularity.
- LimeWire (Mac/PC/Unix...)
A slick Java program with a multitude of functions. It's faster than Kazaa, has no Spyware(???hopefully)/Adware, supports swarm downloads, iTunes integration, etc. For those who are download freaks and are obsessed with downloading music,clips,movies andeven games...LIME WIRE this is all you need. Although its unlike any other p2p software but still there may be certain files which may contain virus or spyware but i assure it has the minimum most chances if you have any good anti spy or anti virus .But about 90% files are virus free and come on friends there are billions of stuff in LIme Wire and a few can always be corrupted.So its best to have a good anti virus before downloading any software not only Lime Wire .But your Pc will never be affected and atleast will not become slow , forget formatting it will never be required.
- BitComet (PC)BitComet is a download manager with support for BitTorrent, HTTP and FTP protocols. It offers UPNP auto-configuration with your router, custom categories to organize your files, adjustable transfer rates, download resuming, preview while downloading and many other advanced features. In addition to BitTorrent, BitComet also supports standard HTTP and FTP downloads, as well as P2P downloading and multi-mirror downloads. The program can also download videos from many popular video sites, such as YouTube, Google Video and others. While the app held its own against better-known competitors in terms of speed and handling multiple torrents, i found the ubiquitous advertisements to be annoying compared to the competition's ad-free environs. Overall, i think BitComet is worth trying .
- Kazaa Lite (Mac/PC)
Kazaa downloads at a faster rate than the others and it has got a large number of users increasing the probability of finding an active user who can share a file which you want to download. There are lots of rare clips in the collection and there may be some files you haven’t ever dreamt of finding there. But these are not the only things waiting for you.Your worst nightmare can haunt you in a few hours. After downloading for some days, you may find your computer too slow in addition to the usual pop-ups which this program can lead to. The adware may be because of Kazaa being a shareware version, but the spyware which is in the program are not going to be anyway helpful to the PC.Try using any spyware detecting program and you will find a number of spyware in the list - you can download the Microsoft Antispyware from microsoft.com and give it a try.
- Morpheus (PC)
Adware, that means you have to watch ads while downloading (actually you don't have to...look elsewhere), but you can share files in Gnutella, eDonkey, Bit Torrent, G2 und Neonet. You have an internal media player and it's very fast. In any PC you can not keep kazaa and morpheus open at the same time. That is a bug. Like kazaa, morpheus is used mainly to download mp3 format songs. It also provides softwares, documents and video files to download.
- BearShare (PC)
Bearshare is a good program for downloading music, pictures, videos and programs. The design of the program looks very good but the bundled software can be very annoying. The program does come in several different languages. Bearshare only works on windows too. The speed of downloading files is quite fast but you do have the risk of downloading junk and viruses. It is easy to use and navigate. This program is good for people new to the filesharing network but i wouldn't recommend this program to anyone. Unfortunatly Bearshare does not impress me.