Mechanical Royalties Explained

This guide covers US mechanical royalties only, based on the Copyright Royalty Board’s rate rules, The MLC and the US Copyright Office, checked Sep 24, 2026. It’s about the money your song earns as a composition, which is separate from what your recording earns.

What are mechanical royalties?

Mechanical royalties are what a song’s writers and publishers earn each time the song is reproduced as audio: pressed on a CD or vinyl, sold as a download, or played as an on-demand stream. A released track holds two copyrights, the song (melody and lyrics) and the sound recording, and mechanicals are paid only on the song. In the US they come from the Section 115 compulsory license, which lets anyone record and distribute a released song as long as they pay the rate set by law. Digital mechanicals go through The MLC. Your distributor doesn’t collect them, so a self-released song can earn mechanicals that nobody picks up.

If you wrote and recorded your own track, you’re owed money twice, through two separate pipes. The recording side comes from your distributor, and our guide to how Spotify pays artists walks through it. The song side comes from The MLC and your PRO, and it only arrives if they know the song is yours.

The US Copyright Office’s guide to how songwriters, composers and performers get paid draws the line clearly: the Section 115 license covers audio-only copies and streams. It doesn’t cover your song in a video, a film or an ad. That’s a sync license, and there’s no compulsory rate for it.

Mechanicals earned outside the US are collected by other organizations under other rules, and this page leaves them out.

Mechanicals are one of two big song royalties. The other is performance money, and the two get mixed up a lot.

Mechanical vs performance royalties

Mechanical royalties pay for reproducing a song, and performance royalties pay for performing it publicly, so a single on-demand stream in the US earns both. The MLC collects the mechanical share from streaming services, while a PRO such as ASCAP or BMI collects the performance share. The type of use decides which one you earn: a CD or vinyl sale earns a mechanical, a radio play earns a performance royalty, and an on-demand stream earns both. The two don’t overlap and neither replaces the other, so an independent songwriter needs to be set up with The MLC and a PRO to collect all of a song’s money from US streaming.

The MLC puts it bluntly in its post on whether you need a PRO and The MLC: you need both. A lot of songwriters join a PRO, watch performance statements show up, and assume streaming is handled. It’s only one of the two song payments.

The recording earns its own money on top. According to The MLC’s overview of digital music royalties, an on-demand stream pays the recording owner through the label or distributor, and SoundExchange collects recording performance royalties only from non-interactive services, the radio-style ones where you can’t pick the song.

Choosing a PRO is its own decision. Our ASCAP vs BMI guide compares the two.

Put mechanical and performance money together and you have most of what people mean by publishing royalties.

What are publishing royalties?

Publishing royalties are the money a song earns as a composition, separate from its recording: mechanical royalties, performance royalties, sync fees and print royalties. They belong to the songwriters and to whoever owns the song’s publishing, and they’re usually split into a writer’s share and a publisher’s share. If you write your own songs and haven’t signed a publishing deal, you own both shares, and each collecting organization has to know that before it can pay you all of it. Performance royalties come through a PRO, US digital mechanicals through The MLC, and sync fees through licenses negotiated one deal at a time, since US law sets no compulsory rate for sync.

“Publisher” sounds like something you need a company for. You don’t. The Copyright Office guide says you can administer your own publishing, or hire an administrator that collects for a fee, usually a percentage of royalties. That fee is the trade: your time against their cut.

Print royalties cover sheet music and printed lyrics. For most self-released artists they’re small. Sync is the opposite, with no set rate: you’re paid whatever you and the licensee agree to.

Of the four, mechanicals are the only one with rates written into US law, which makes them the easiest to put numbers on.

Mechanical royalty rates in 2026

For 2026, the US mechanical rate for physical copies and permanent downloads is 13.1 cents per song, or 2.52 cents per minute of playing time (or fraction of a minute) if that’s larger, according to the Copyright Royalty Judges’ notice in the Federal Register of Dec 1, 2025. The per-minute rate wins once a song runs past 5 minutes. On-demand streaming works differently: under Phonorecords IV, the Copyright Royalty Board’s rules for 2023 to 2027, the headline percentage for 2026 is 15.3% of a service’s revenue, the starting point for one royalty pool shared across every song the service streams. Both rates pay for the song, not the recording.

The 2026 physical and download rate comes from the Federal Register notice of Dec 1, 2025, which adjusts it for inflation each year. Two quick examples at the 2026 rate:

• 1,000 downloads of a 3:40 song: 1,000 × 13.1 cents = $131 owed to the song’s owners.
• A 5:30 song counts as 6 minutes, so each copy owes 6 × 2.52 = 15.12 cents.

The streaming percentages were fixed in advance in the Phonorecords IV determination, with no inflation adjustment:

Rates for 2028 to 2032 are being set in the Phonorecords V proceeding. As of Sep 24, 2026, the Copyright Royalty Board’s case page lists it as open, so if you see a 2028 rate quoted somewhere, it’s a proposal, not the law.

If you’re pressing vinyl of your own songs, you’re paying yourself. If you’re pressing a cover, that 13.1 cents per copy is a real cost to budget for.

That 15.3% doesn’t turn into a per-stream number on its own, and the steps between the two are where most confusion lives.

How streaming mechanicals are calculated

US streaming mechanicals are worked out in four steps for each type of service offering, every month: calculate an all-in song royalty, subtract what the service paid for performance rights, compare the result with a per-subscriber minimum and keep the larger amount, then have The MLC divide that pool by total plays and credit each song for its own plays. The rules come from Phonorecords IV, the Copyright Royalty Board’s rate terms for 2023 to 2027. There’s no fixed rate per stream, so the prerequisite for being paid sits on your side: the song has to be registered with The MLC and matched to the recording that was played.

Here’s how the Phonorecords IV rules play out for a standard paid subscription, the kind you use on your phone:

1. All-in royalty. The greater of 15.3% of service revenue (the 2026 figure) or a share of what the service pays record labels. For a standalone portable subscription, that label-based figure is the lesser of 26.2% of label payments or $1.10 per subscriber. Free ad-supported tiers use 26.2% of label payments, and bundles use 24.5%.
2. Subtract performance royalties. What the service paid PROs for the same songs comes out.
3. Apply the floor. The pool can’t drop below a per-subscriber minimum: 60 cents for a standalone portable subscription. Free ad-supported tiers have no floor.
4. Split by plays. The MLC divides the pool by all plays on that offering and multiplies by your song’s plays.

A few details change your share. A play counts only at 30 seconds or more. Long songs count as more than one play: 5:01 to 6:00 is 1.2 plays, and each extra minute adds 0.2. A family plan counts as 1.75 subscribers and a student plan as 0.5, and free trials pay nothing.

So the mechanical on a stream is a sliver of a sliver, and it’s worth claiming anyway because it adds up across every service. The recording side of the same stream is a different pool, covered in how Spotify pays artists.

Step 4 only works if The MLC knows who owns your song, so it helps to know who collects what.

Who collects mechanical royalties in the US?

The MLC (Mechanical Licensing Collective) collects US mechanical royalties from streaming and download services under a blanket license that has been available since Jan 1, 2021. The Music Modernization Act created that blanket license and replaced song-by-song licensing for digital uses, and The MLC pays its members monthly. Physical copies such as CDs and vinyl still use the older system: whoever presses them licenses each song, either by sending a notice of intention to the copyright owner or through an agency such as the Harry Fox Agency. Your distributor pays you for the recording, and the song’s mechanicals travel a separate route.

The Copyright Office’s page on the Section 115 blanket license covers the switch. The MMA FAQ explains why membership doesn’t cost you anything: the digital services fund The MLC’s operating costs.

For physical releases, the Copyright Office guide says the Harry Fox Agency or Music Reports often handle direct licensing. It also notes that to be owed a compulsory royalty, you generally need to show up in the Copyright Office’s registration or public records.

Recording someone else’s song flips your role: now you owe the mechanical. The Harry Fox Agency’s Songfile licenses covers for CDs, downloads, ringtones and streams. Our guide to cover song licensing goes through the options.

Knowing who collects doesn’t mean they know about your song. That part’s on you.

How to collect your mechanical royalties

Independent songwriters collect US mechanical royalties in one of two ways: join The MLC as a member and register their songs themselves, or sign with a publishing administrator that registers and collects for them. TheDebutRoom’s method for choosing comes down to three questions: do you already have a publisher or administrator, how many songs and co-writers you need to keep registered, and whether you’d rather pay a commission than do the admin yourself. Membership in The MLC is free, while an administrator such as TuneCore Publishing charges a fee and takes a share of what it collects, but also collects publishing money The MLC doesn’t handle. Either route needs accurate song data: titles, writers, splits and the recordings each song appears on.

Route 1: The MLC directly. Start with The MLC’s four questions. If you’ve signed with a publisher or an administrator collects for you, you probably shouldn’t self-administer. If you kept your own rights, join as a Member. Membership is free. Per The MLC’s payments FAQ, it pays about 75 days after each month ends (January usage is paid in April), and the minimum payout is $5 by ACH, $100 by check or $250 by wire. This route suits you if you have a small catalog, few co-writers and don’t mind keeping registrations current.

Route 2: a publishing administrator. TuneCore Publishing costs a one-time $75 per songwriter, per TuneCore’s help page on Publishing cost. The TuneCore Publishing page says you need to be affiliated with a PRO, you keep 100% of your copyrights, it collects mechanicals from YouTube and social platforms too, and royalties usually start 9 to 12 months after you register, posted quarterly.

Pick one route per song. If an administrator already collects your mechanicals, The MLC’s four questions point you away from registering the same songs yourself. If you’re weighing TuneCore for distribution too, our TuneCore review covers the rest of the service.

Skip both routes and the money doesn’t disappear. It goes to someone else.

What happens to unclaimed mechanical royalties

TheDebutRoom’s view: unclaimed mechanical royalties are the easiest money an independent songwriter loses, because the rules hand it to someone else on a schedule. The MLC holds royalties it can’t match to an owner for at least 3 years, with interest, while it tries to find out who they belong to. After that, unmatched money can be paid out by market share, meaning in proportion to what publishers already earn, so the biggest catalogs get the biggest cut. The MLC plans its first market share distribution for early 2027, covering 2021 usage. For songs streamed in 2021, registering before then is what keeps their money out of that pool.

The rules are on The MLC’s pages about unmatched and unclaimed royalties and market share distributions. Songwriters get at least 50% of what publishers receive in that payout, but you only get that if you’re already earning through The MLC. An unregistered songwriter gets nothing from it.

The frustrating part: your song can be streaming fine, your distributor pays you for the recording every month, and nothing looks wrong. The missing mechanicals don’t show up as a gap on any statement you get. You only see them once your songs are registered and matched.

If you released songs any time since 2021 and never joined The MLC or signed with an administrator, that’s this week’s job, before the 2027 distribution.

More on the business side of your music, from PROs to copyright, is in the royalties hub.