Royalty-free music for commercial use: what does it mean?
Royalty-free is not a legal term, and that is precisely the problem. It is used for three different situations: music you pay for once instead of per use, music whose rights have expired, and music with no rights holder at all. Only the last means you owe nothing to Buma/Stemra and Sena in the Netherlands.
What sellers mean by it
With most suppliers of royalty-free background music, royalty-free means: you buy one licence and may then use the track without limit within the terms. Royalty-free refers to the absence of ongoing payments to that service.
That says nothing about Buma/Stemra and Sena. If a human composer is behind it who is affiliated, then in the Netherlands payment is simply due on top of what you paid the stock service. Two bills, and the second arrives later.
What it ought to mean legally
Nothing is genuinely due only when there is nobody who can claim anything. That is the case for work whose term of protection has expired and whose recording carries no neighbouring right, and for music with no human author.
For everything in between a rights holder exists. Whether they come forward is a matter of time and of representation, not of whether they have a claim. The three routes are set out in playing music without Buma and Sena.
The question you should ask
Do not ask a provider whether the music is royalty-free — that tells you almost nothing. Ask whether the Buma/Stemra and Sena levies are included in the amount, and if not, who pays them.
With most providers the answer is that the levies come on top and the bill sits with you. That is not a criticism of them; it is how the system works and they cannot change it. But it does make quotes incomparable as long as you do not ask.
Tariffs: Buma/Stemra and Sena, tariff year 2026. Sources are published on bumastemra.nl and sena.nl.
Work out what you save on your current licence.
Slide in your situation and you will see what you currently pay in music rights every year. That amount disappears, on top of what you save on your current music subscription.
Why it does hold up with us
RadioMatic music has no human author. No composer, no lyricist, no performing artist, no commercially released phonogram. So there is nobody who can claim anything, and that is a different situation from a licence that rules out ongoing payments.
We therefore do not say our music is royalty-free in the marketing sense, but that no rights holder exists. That is more precise, and it can be checked.
Read the legal reasoningQuestions that come with this
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