Glossary / Streaming

Industry terms

Streaming royalties

Streaming royalties are the money streaming services pay out when your music is played, split between the owners of the recording and the owners of the song.

Also called: royalties, streaming payouts, per-stream payout

By Aulto · Last reviewed

Who gets paid from a stream?

Two sides. The recording side (label or independent artist, through the distributor) is paid for the master. The song side (songwriters and publishers) is paid for the composition, through publishers and collecting societies. In India, IPRS collects for songwriters and publishers.

How much does one stream pay?

There's no fixed rate. Each service shares a portion of its revenue by each rights holder's share of listening, so the amount per stream varies by service, country and subscription type.

Why do the payments arrive late?

Services report to distributors, who report to you, often a month or more after the plays happened.

Example

A song streamed in India mostly by free-tier listeners usually earns less per stream than the same song streamed by paying subscribers abroad.

  • Master recording

    The master recording is the final, released version of a recorded song, and whoever owns it owns the rights to that specific recording.

  • Music distributor

    A music distributor delivers your releases to streaming services and stores, and collects the money they earn from plays and sales.

  • DSP

    DSP (digital service provider) is the industry's name for streaming services and digital stores, like Spotify, JioSaavn, Apple Music and YouTube Music.

  • 30-second rule

    On Spotify, a play counts as a stream once someone has listened to a track for 30 seconds or more.

  • Algorithmic playlist

    An algorithmic playlist is made automatically for each listener from what they play, like Spotify's Release Radar and Discover Weekly.

  • Editorial playlist

    An editorial playlist is a playlist picked by a streaming service's own team of editors, as opposed to one generated by its algorithm or made by users.

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