Jul 7, 2011 11:41 GMT  ·  By

Amazon, the giant online retailer currently winning in a legal dispute with Apple, has announced three enhancements to Amazon Cloud Drive and Cloud Player this week.

Specifically, Amazon has announced new storage plans that include unlimited space for music, free storage for all Amazon MP3 purchases, and web Cloud Player support for iPad.

Regarding the latter announcement - Cloud Player for Web on iPad - Amazon says it enables customers to play music stored in the cloud on any device and, most recently, the iOS-powered iPad too.

“Cloud Player, combined with unlimited space for music in Cloud Drive, enables customers to play music stored in the cloud on any Android phone, Android tablet, Mac, PC, and now on their iPad,” Amazon said.

According to the American online retailer, the software engineers tasked with optimizing Cloud Player for Web were given specific instructions to allow streaming through Safari, Apple’s web browser on Mac OS and iOS.

“Cloud Player for Web has been optimized to offer customers streaming playback of their Cloud Drive music using the Safari browser for iPad,” said Amazon.

iPad users can easily use the Cloud Player by launching Safari on their tablets and visiting www.amazon.com/cloudplayer.

Those who have content stored with their own accounts will be able to start listening to their music instantly.

An update that concerns all customers, everyone can automatically start with 5 GB of free Cloud Drive storage to begin uploading their music library. For a limited time, those who purchase any Cloud Drive storage plan will now receive unlimited space for music for free.

Cloud Drive supports any kind of files, not just music, therefore customers can use it as a backup solution, much like Dropbox.

Amazon also confirmed that customers who qualified for the free 20GB from earlier promotions are now eligible to receive the unlimited space for music at no additional cost.