Free music distribution is nearly gone. Among the best-known free Spotify distributors, RouteNote still runs a genuine $0 tier and takes 15% of your royalties for it. Amuse, UnitedMasters, TuneCore, DistroKid and Ditto now list paid plans only, starting between $19 and $24.99 a year.
For years the answer to "do I have to pay to get on Spotify?" was no. Free music distribution was a real category, and several services ran $0 tiers that took a percentage of royalties instead of an upfront fee. That category has almost closed.
Of the seven distributors checked for this article, one still lists a free plan. Five of the rest use annual subscriptions from $19 to $24.99, while CD Baby charges a one-time fee per release ($9.99 per single, $14.99 per album). Below is what survives, what the surviving free tier actually costs you in royalty share, and the earnings point where paying upfront becomes the cheaper choice.
For how distribution works underneath the pricing, see the Music Distribution Guide. For where distribution sits inside a release timeline, see How to Plan a Music Release Step by Step.
What Free Music Distribution Costs Now
Every figure below was read from the service's own pricing or support page on 22 July 2026. Prices are USD.
Service | Free tier? | Entry price | Royalties you keep |
|---|---|---|---|
RouteNote | Yes | $0 | 85% on Free, 100% on Premium |
Ditto | No | $19/year (Starter) | 100% on streaming, 85% on publishing and sync |
UnitedMasters | No | $19.99/year (DEBUT+) | 100% on DEBUT+ and SELECT |
Amuse | No | $23.99/year (Artist) | 100%, minus a 15% fee on YouTube Content ID |
DistroKid | No | $24.99/year (Musician) | 100% |
TuneCore | No | $24.99/year (Rising Artist) | Not stated on its pricing page |
CD Baby | No | $9.99 per single, one-time | 91% on downloads and streaming, less on MLC, social video and sync |
Two patterns show up in that table. The first is that the paid entry price has converged: five of the seven cluster between $19 and $24.99 a year for unlimited releases. The second is that "100% royalties" is now the standard sales pitch rather than a premium feature, which is exactly why the $0 tiers stopped making sense for the companies running them.
Terms change without announcement. Read the current pricing page before you sign up, whatever any comparison article tells you.
The One Free Tier Still Standing
RouteNote splits its catalog into Free and Premium, and you choose per release.
On Free you pay nothing and RouteNote keeps 15% of streaming and download royalties. On Premium you pay once per release and keep 100%: $10 for a single, $20 for an EP of two to six tracks, $30 for an album of seven to eighteen tracks, and $45 for anything longer. After the first year, Premium releases carry a $9.99 annual renewal.
The part most comparison pages get wrong is what the free tier excludes. On RouteNote, both tiers get the full store list, YouTube Content ID, Facebook rights management and SoundCloud monetization at no extra charge, and both accept MP3 and FLAC. The documented difference is the 15% and the depth of RouteNote Trends: all users get basic Trends data, and Premium adds the 90-day view and the interactive fan-location map.
So the free tier is not a stripped-down delivery pipe. It is the same delivery at a commission.
The Breakeven Math on 15%
A percentage looks harmless until you convert it into dollars against a fixed fee.
RouteNote Premium on a single costs $10 in year one, then $9.99 a year. Free costs 15% of whatever that release earns. The two meet at about $67 a year in royalties for that single.
Below $67, the free plan is cheaper. Above it, you are paying more than the fee to avoid the fee.
The same arithmetic on longer releases:
Release type | Premium fee (year 1) | Free plan costs more once the release earns |
|---|---|---|
Single | $10 | about $67/year |
EP (2 to 6 tracks) | $20 | about $133/year |
Album (7 to 18 tracks) | $30 | about $200/year |
Against an unlimited subscription the threshold is a catalog number, not a release number. At $24.99 a year for unlimited uploads, a 15% commission costs you more once your whole catalog clears roughly $167 a year. That is a low bar. A single track holding a small playlist can pass it.
This is the honest case for free distribution: it is cheapest when you are earning almost nothing, and it gets expensive faster than most artists expect. For a fuller breakdown of what comes out of a payout before it reaches you, see distribution splits and fees explained.
The Cheapest Ways In When You Have No Budget
Free is not the only zero-risk option, and it is not always the cheapest one.
If you have no money at all, RouteNote Free gets the release live for nothing and you can move it to Premium later. If you can spend once and never again, CD Baby charges $9.99 for a single and $14.99 for an album with no subscription, which means no annual renewal to forget about. If you plan to put out more than two releases in a year, an unlimited plan at $19 to $24.99 beats paying per release almost immediately.
The decision is really about which cost you can absorb: a percentage forever, a one-time fee per release, or a yearly subscription. Most independent artists start on the percentage and stay there long past the point where it stopped being the cheap option.
How to Check a Free Tier Before You Trust It
Every comparison of free distribution, including this one, starts going stale the day it is published. Three of the services above advertised free delivery not long ago. Checking takes about two minutes per service, and it is worth doing before you upload anything.
Open the service's own pricing page, not a review site, and answer four questions in order:
Is a $0 or "Free" plan listed on the pricing page itself? If free only appears in blog posts or old help articles, it is probably retired.
What percentage does the free plan keep? A free tier is priced in royalty share, so the number should be stated plainly. If you cannot find it, treat that as a red flag.
Does the free plan include YouTube Content ID and rights management, or are those paid add-ons? This is where free tiers differ most from each other.
What happens to live releases if you stop paying or downgrade? Ask before you have a catalog riding on the answer.
Write down the date you checked. When you revisit the decision a year later, you will know whether the numbers you based it on still apply.
What Switching Actually Involves
Moving between plans or between services is routine, but the order matters.
Within RouteNote, you can move a release from Premium down to Free at any time at no cost, so a Premium purchase is not a permanent commitment. Moving between two different distributors is more involved. Record the ISRC for every track before you start, then upload to the new service with the same audio files, ISRCs and release metadata. That match is what distributors ask for, and DistroKid states plainly that play counts and playlist placements cannot be guaranteed.
Confirm the new delivery is live everywhere before you take the old one down. A gap in availability is a risk you do not need to take, and nothing about a cheaper plan is worth it.
For a side-by-side look at the paid options, see DistroKid vs. TuneCore vs. CD Baby. For a decision framework, see How to Choose a Music Distribution Service.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is there still a free way to get music on Spotify?
Yes. RouteNote's Free plan delivers to Spotify with no upfront fee and takes 15% of royalties instead. Of the seven distributors checked here, it was the only one still listing a $0 option.
Do Amuse and UnitedMasters still have free tiers?
Neither lists one now. Amuse's pricing page starts at $23.99 a year and UnitedMasters starts at $19.99 a year for DEBUT+, both advertising 100% royalties on paid plans.
At what point does paying beat a free plan?
Around $67 a year in royalties for a single on RouteNote Premium, or roughly $167 a year across your catalog against a $24.99 unlimited subscription. Below those numbers, the commission is cheaper.
Can I move a release off a paid plan later?
On RouteNote, yes. A Premium release can be downgraded to Free at any time at no cost. Policies differ by service, so check before you pay if that flexibility matters to you.
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