ASCAP vs BMI: which PRO should you join?

ASCAP vs BMI: the short answer

For a songwriter who releases their own music, ASCAP and BMI are close enough that joining either one beats waiting to pick. Both are free for writers, charge no yearly dues and pay quarterly. The real difference is the publisher share, half of every performance royalty. BMI pays it straight to you if you have no publisher. ASCAP pays it only through a publisher membership, which is free if you join as writer and publisher on the same day. ASCAP also has lower paper check minimums and lets you resign online. This covers US performing rights, with fees and rules from ascap.com and bmi.com as checked on Sep 24, 2026.

Here’s a quick way to sort yourself. If you write your own songs, release them through a distributor and have never signed a publishing deal, you self-publish. That’s most people reading this. For you, the question is whether you’d rather fill in one form (BMI) or two forms on the same day (ASCAP). Either way, you end up collecting 100% of what the PRO pays on your songs.

What nobody can tell you in advance is which one will pay more for your particular songs. It depends on where they get played, and neither society promises a rate per play. Anyone who says one PRO “always pays more” is guessing.

The two are run differently, if that matters to you. ASCAP calls itself the only US PRO operating on a not-for-profit basis and says it’s governed by its songwriter and publisher members. BMI has been majority owned by the investment firm New Mountain Capital since the deal closed in Feb 2024.

Before the details, it helps to know what a PRO actually collects, because it’s less than people think.

What ASCAP and BMI collect (and what they don’t)

ASCAP and BMI are US performing rights organizations (PROs): they license public performances of songs and pay the songwriters and publishers. Radio stations, TV networks, venues, bars, restaurants and digital services pay a PRO for the right to play its catalog, and the PRO pays that money out per song. Each performance royalty splits into a writer share and a publisher share, 50% each. A PRO pays for the composition, meaning the song itself, not the recording. It doesn’t collect mechanical royalties, and it doesn’t pay the streaming royalties your distributor sends you. As a songwriter you can belong to only one US PRO at a time, per ASCAP’s joining FAQ.

That last rule sounds scarier than it is. It’s about you, not the song. If your co-writer is at BMI and you’re at ASCAP, you each register the song with your own PRO and each society pays its own member.

It also helps to know what you’re not signing up for. The money a distributor pays you for streams is the recording side, and it keeps flowing whether or not you join a PRO. Our page on how Spotify pays artists covers that side. Mechanical royalties are a third pot with its own collectors, explained in our guide to mechanical royalties.

So a PRO is one piece of the songwriting money. It’s the piece that pays when your song is on the radio, in a TV show, in a bar’s playlist or in your own set at a licensed venue.

Getting that piece costs nothing for a writer at either society. The publisher half is where the two paths split.

How much it costs to join ASCAP and BMI

Joining ASCAP or BMI as a songwriter costs nothing, and neither charges yearly dues. The fees only apply to publisher accounts. ASCAP waives its publisher application fee if you join as a writer and a publisher at the same time; join as a publisher later and it’s a one-time, non-refundable $50. BMI charges a one-time fee to affiliate a publishing company: $175 for an individual, $250 for a corporation or LLC, and $500 for a partnership, not refundable or taken from future royalties. These come from ASCAP’s joining FAQ and BMI’s publishing FAQ, checked Sep 24, 2026.

Where each one says so:

• ASCAP: its joining FAQ covers the free writer membership, the same-day publisher waiver and the $50 fee. ASCAP calls the waiver temporary, so check it again on the day you apply.
• BMI: the songwriter fee FAQ says there are no fees or dues for writers, and the publishing company FAQ lists the $175, $250 and $500 tiers.

Both check who you are. ASCAP asks every applicant for a government ID and a “liveness check”, and each member of a band applies separately. BMI’s writer application asks for your full legal name, your Social Security number for tax forms and any PRO you belonged to before. You need at least one song out in public to join ASCAP as a writer, and a song on a streaming service counts.

Here’s the catch in those numbers. The $50 or $175 only matters if you need a publisher account. Whether you do depends on which PRO you pick.

The publisher share: where the choice actually matters

TheDebutRoom’s view is that the publisher share is the one difference between ASCAP and BMI that changes what a self-published songwriter gets paid. Every performance royalty is half writer share and half publisher share. BMI pays both halves to the songwriter on self-published works, with no publishing company needed; its catalog shows “Manuscript” as a placeholder where a publisher would be. ASCAP only pays the publisher share to a publisher member, so a self-published writer needs an ASCAP publisher membership as well. At ASCAP that’s free if you join as writer and publisher on the same day, and $50 if you add it later.

This is the part people get wrong, and it’s real money. Join ASCAP as a writer only, never set up the publisher side, and ASCAP’s own publisher explainer says you could be missing out, since the publisher’s 50% needs a publisher member to collect it.

At BMI the same mistake can’t happen. The self-publishing FAQ says you need not affiliate a publishing entity to receive publishing shares, and that setting one up won’t mean you receive more royalties. BMI treats the two halves as one 200% unit split between writers and publishers.

So work it out from where you are today:

1. Joining ASCAP? Pick the Writer & Publisher option on the same application. It costs nothing, and ASCAP’s individual publisher option runs on your Social Security number, so you don’t need to form a company.
2. Joining BMI and self-publishing? Skip the publisher account. It costs $175 and pays you nothing extra.
3. Already an ASCAP writer without a publisher account? Adding one costs $50. Weigh that against what your songs earn now.

One more reason to join a PRO as a writer at all: publishing admin services can’t collect the writer share for you. DistroKid’s help center says DistroKid Publishing can only collect the publisher share of performance royalties if you aren’t in a PRO. Our DistroKid vs TuneCore comparison covers both publishing admin services.

Once the money has a way to reach you, the next question is when it shows up.

When ASCAP and BMI pay you

ASCAP and BMI both pay quarterly, and both pay US royalties several months after the songs were played. ASCAP pays each quarter’s writer distribution for performances from three quarters earlier; its schedule shows Jan to Mar 2026 performances paid to writers in Oct 2026. BMI pays in February, May, August and November, and its application kit warns that statements for your first quarter may not arrive until 8 to 9 months after that quarter ends. With direct deposit, ASCAP pays any royalty of $1 or more and BMI pays from $2. Paper checks need $100 at ASCAP, and $250 at BMI, except in the August payment, when BMI lowers it to $25.

Set your expectations for the first year. Join in March, get a song on college radio in April, and at either society you’re looking at next year before that play shows up. That’s normal. It’s not a sign something went wrong.

Where it bites is paper checks. On ASCAP’s payment page, anything under $100 rolls forward until you cross it. BMI’s Royalty Policy Manual holds small balances for a rolling 12 quarters until they reach the minimum. With a few dollars a quarter, that can mean years without a check.

The fix is the same at both: turn on direct deposit in ASCAP’s Member Access or BMI’s Online Services the day you join. The exact dates are on ASCAP’s distribution schedule; BMI’s timing is in its writer application kit.

Direct deposit is also the key to getting paid for your own gigs.

Getting paid for live shows: ASCAP OnStage vs BMI Live

ASCAP OnStage and BMI Live both pay you for performing your own songs at a venue the PRO licenses, and both need direct deposit set up first. You report the show yourself: date, venue and setlist. The deadline is the main difference. ASCAP OnStage sets deadlines by quarter: a show from October 1 to December 31 has to be in by March 31 of the next year. BMI Live accepts performances up to 9 months after the show. Only songwriters can submit, not publishers. The payment depends on license fees rather than a set rate per show, and ASCAP says bigger venues pay more.

On ASCAP OnStage, only one writer on the song needs to file the claim, and you file it in Member Access. The royalty arrives with the normal domestic distribution.

BMI Live works the same way from your side: log in to Online Services or the BMI app, enter the show and the setlist. It pays quarterly at a variable rate, and it only counts licensed public performances in the US.

If you play out every weekend, this is money you’re leaving on the table without a habit. Put it in your post-show routine: load out, get paid by the venue, file the setlist before bed. BMI’s longer window forgives a late filer. ASCAP’s quarter-based deadline doesn’t, so gigging ASCAP members should file monthly at least.

That leaves one fear: picking wrong and being stuck.

Switching from BMI to ASCAP (or back)

You can switch between ASCAP and BMI, but only in a window that opens every two years. BMI’s writer agreement runs in two-year terms that renew automatically, and you end it by sending notice 3 to 6 months before a term ends, by registered, certified or tracked mail; email isn’t accepted. ASCAP opens a three-month resignation window every two years, based on your election date, and you resign online in Member Access. TheDebutRoom weighs PROs by rules you can check before you sign, like publisher setup, payout minimums and how you leave, because those decide your first few years more than reputation does.

The steps to leave BMI, from its writer agreement and agreement info page:

1. Find the end date of your current term on your agreement.
2. Count back 6 months. Your notice has to arrive in the window between 6 and 3 months before that date.
3. Sign the notice and send it by a method that records the send date. Email doesn’t count.

The steps to leave ASCAP, from its resignation FAQ:

1. Wait for your three-month window, then open Member Access and go to Profile, then Membership Status. Your notice can’t be taken back once sent.
2. Choose whether ASCAP keeps licensing the songs you wrote as a member or whether you’ll try to move them to your new PRO.
3. If you self-publish through an ASCAP publisher account, resign that account too, or the songs can’t move.

Your old songs don’t vanish in either case. Both societies keep paying under licenses that were already signed when you left. ASCAP also warns about foreign royalties: they go to whichever society currently claims you, so a gap between leaving one PRO and joining the next can lose you money. Line up the new membership to start right as the old one ends.

If you’re still deciding, the rest of the royalties hub covers the other places songwriting money comes from.