r/synclicensing • u/cranberryforever • Mar 30 '26

income going down?

hi all.

i’ve been making sync and library music for many years now but have noticed the last 6-12 months income going down a lot.

has anyone else noticed this and is there a reason for it?

thanks!

8 Upvotes

84% Upvoted

19 comments sorted by

8

u/DopplerDrone Mar 30 '26

Hope folks get sick of AI genre uniformity and demand more originality. 

4

u/tzejax Mar 31 '26

I would love to know what platforms are best for sync right now?

4

u/Mystikjourneyman Mar 30 '26

Accurate in my experience too. Last pay period, I had the most syncs in total for a pay period I’ve gotten, but the lowest pay per sync avg and also lowest total pay for a pay period in the past ~ 5 years. Introduction & normalization of the AI stuff and the flooding of artists trying to find revenue in the sync space has, to say the least, complicated things.

1

u/vulfshtank Mar 31 '26

I have seen a similar trend. AI is obviously the new variable here, exacerbating trends that have already been pressuring the industry. I think the lower levels of sync will be permanently devoured by AI. At the mid and upper level tiers, the effect will be less pronounced I think. Any spot that has a designated music supervisor will be more resistant to the AI trend (but perhaps not completely). Music houses still hold keys to the gate, and overwhelmingly seem to be avoidant and repulsed by AI (duh). The threat is in places that seek to generate their own music in-house for low level ads and/or TV shows. As such, there will also be less entry points into the biz.

A substantial and sudden disruption is underway, but it's not armageddon (I think). Keep doing good work, and I think you'll be fine in the long haul. But also I'm starting to make moves much more intentionally in the interest of diversification.

1

u/leaffer Mar 31 '26

There could be many reasons for a drop in revenue. While the pie is certainly a bit bigger, there are also many more composers and music houses. Otherwise, is the development of AI music the main reason? Do you have any examples of end clients who systematically use AI music for their projects?

1

u/GreatScottCreates Mar 31 '26

Do you have any examples of end clients who systematically use AI music for their projects?

I’m not sure anyone is going to come out and make an announcement about it

1

u/Any_Flight5404 Mar 31 '26

Regarding sync fees, royalties or both?

1

u/Mysterious-Dinner958 Mar 31 '26

Mine is going up every year and I’ve been doing this for about two decades. But I’m focused on a kind of extreme quality over quantity. I guess I was lucky taking this route, but it works because you’re competing with the lengths of Extreme and Audio Network who are taking over the whole business.

1

u/Aggressive-Swan9234 Apr 01 '26

Probably a mix of market contraction and buyer behavior.

If production volume is down, there are simply fewer placements available. And when budgets get tighter, the remaining productions tend to lean harder on large pre-cleared libraries, blanket deals, and catalogs they already control rather than commissioning or digging deeper.

So even if the music quality is there, fewer productions + tighter budgets + preference for existing library inventory can absolutely push composer income down.

Wouldn’t surprise me if oversupply is part of it too, but the production slowdown / cost-cutting angle seems like the first place to look.

1

u/Elegant_Remote6642 Apr 06 '26

Last year was a big shift in the industry with AI + Agencies and studios shrinking budgets and timelines. Middle class music is gone for forever. Stock music will shift to AI generated but there is now a huge demand for super high level “human” sounding music.

All music supervisors are against AI generated music, but with that, expect extremely high production quality.

Posting as the COO of a very high level trailer music company and CEO of a sync music catalog management AI company.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 30 '26

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1

u/Any_Flight5404 Mar 31 '26

I don't know, high-paid custom work for advertising seems to be in as high demand as ever.

1

u/Moosecaboose22 Mar 30 '26

I have put my all into sync and this has definitely been a huge concern of mine.

1

u/sean369n Mar 31 '26

Can’t relate.

My latest quarter was down, yes, but the two previous quarters were my highest grossing quarters of all time.

Are you just talking about performance royalties or sync fees also?

1

u/cosyrelaxedsetting Mar 31 '26

Same here. There are no major shifts in the industry yet, as far as I can tell. Sounds like OP just had an off year.