Comprehensive CD Baby Review 2024: Pricing, Features & Everything You Need to Know

Top Reason to Choose CD Baby

Music stays in stores. Unlimited distribution for a flat annual fee sounds great, but you’re renting distribution. If the day ever comes when you can’t afford to pay rent, your music gets evicted from all stores. That threat is always there as long as your distribution is on a subscription. The pricing makes it seem like an afterthought. $20 or $30 annually isn’t much, and I’m sure most people don’t envision a time when they wouldn’t be able to pay such a small amount, but as the saying goes, “ish happens”. I chatted with an artist whose music was removed while he was in a coma, fighting for his life because his debit card couldn’t be charged. Peace of mind goes a long way. The way CD Baby secures distribution is to take 9% of the revenue generated by your releases in perpetuity after you pay a $10 one-time fee for each release. 

Top Features

Stages

CD Baby has a revenue share model, sacrificing a percentage becomes punitive the more you earn. Distributors must justify the growing cost for artists to make sense of continuing to use their service. CD Baby addresses this with their Stages program, which offers more expansive services the more an artist grows. At the Plus Stage, artists are no longer required to pay upfront fees per release and are only subject to their 9% royalty split. At the Label Services Stage, they open up actual editorial playlist pitching, fast-tracked approval for Pandora radio, and video delivery to Apple Music. 

Trending Reports

Daily updates on the performance of your releases are provided through Trending Reports on CD Baby. This is a common feature, but CD Baby provides more information than its competitors, showing the sources of your streaming activity: Search, Radio, etc. This is information you’re not even allowed to see in Spotify for artists. The value of the information comes down to what you can do with it, so what can you do with this info? Things like a notable performance, a mention by an influencer, usage of your music in an influencer’s content, a TV show, or a movie could all spike activity from search. If you have those things happen and no spike happens from that source, it informs you of the value of the influencer, TV show, or movie. Paying for sponsored posts from an influencer that doesn’t move the needle isn’t the smartest thing to do, so the information can save you a lot of money.

The Rundown 

Model:  

One-time fee per release + Revenue share 

Price: 

$10 per release + 9% 

Transaction Fees: 

ACH - US: $0 

PayPal - US 2% 

Stores: 

Unlimited Inventory 

Distribution to New Stores: 

Unlimited

Artists: 

Unlimited

Split Pay: 

No

Keeps Music Live: 

Yes - 9% revenue split 

Exclusivity:

No Exclusivity clause. 

Customer Support:

Ok 

Content ID:

Yes - 30% of Royalties

AI Licensing Rule

No official policy or plans to allow AI to access artists' music for LLM 

Streaming Fraud 

Removal + Fine 

Music Fights Fraud Alliance Member 

Yes - If you have been banned by another distributor, you may automatically be banned by SoundCloud. Music Fights Fraud is a database of artists that have been flagged. 

KYA (Know-Your-Artist) / KYC (Know-Your-Customer)

This is promoted as a protective tool and requires you to upload your State ID to verify your identity. The Music Fights Fraud alliance and its members have plans to use this information for their database, which will likely be used for global bans and work as a No-Fly list for music distribution. 

No - CD Baby does not require KYA/KYC 

UPC Codes:

Included + Bring your own 

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Rating 

Transparency: Great. Customer support: Ok. Payment: Great - you can avoid any fees by having funds sent directly to your bank account. Stores: Great - extensive library of stores. Features: Great. Longevity: Great. Fees: Great - BeatPort, Dolby Atmos, Shazam, and other platforms don't cost extra. Red Flags: none. Track Record: Great. 

 Final Assessment 

CD Baby's parent company, Downtown Holdings, was bought out by Virgin Music, a subsidiary of Universal Music Group. It's unclear what UMG's plans are for CD Baby. Paying a one-time fee per release gives you peace of mind, theoretically, because the only thing constant is change. As we see here, distributors get acquired, policies change, and pricing models change, so you only have peace of mind for as long as things remain the same. Revenue split models are safety net models where you don't pay if you don't earn. CD Baby charges you per release and puts you in a financial hole from launch. The more music you release, the deeper the hole. You don't have the freedom to experiment with different mixes, styles, or songs to find what works. Everything song that fails eats into the profit of every song that succeeds. Streaming platforms are imposing monetization thresholds, resulting in songs being demonitized due to performance that doesn't qualify for payments. That being said, CD Baby is for artists who release at lower volumes than users of a service like Distrokid. For some artists, the process of putting together a single song can take a year or more. A lot is being invested into each song, and that can increase the likelihood of each song recouping its cost of distribution. Historically, CD Baby has had outstanding service and been one of the most secure options on the market, but post-acquisition, it's not a guarantee that it remains the same. 

Take a tour of CD Baby's Website: CDbaby.com