View transcript

A sound recording is the legal term for the thing that's produced when you perform and record a musical work.

With the musical work being the written part, the actual lyrics and musical composition.

When we talk about sound recording splits, we are talking about how you divide up the income from the sound recording, not the musical work.

And even though the sound recording includes the musical work that's a whole separate thing.

Typically a producer and performer of some sort will work together collaboratively to create the sound recording.

That sound recording is reproduced into physical and digital formats and those pop up on streaming and download platforms, on the radio, and in music shops and such.

Every time a sound recording is used or sold in one of these ways or in any other way it could be used in public or commercially, a payment called a royalty accrues.

That's why it's so important to determine splits of the sound recording in advance, because this percentage determines the royalty income that each party receives.

You will also probably need to agree on a royalty split with the producer you've collaborated with.

If there is one.

That split will usually come out of your percentage share of income, not from the total sound recording.

Let's say a contract is drawn up between you as an artist and a record label.

That contract will state each party's royalty share from every sale or use.

This could be for instance, 25% to you and 75% to the record label.

But these rates vary depending on the deal structure and what the income stream is.

We dig deeper into how all of this works on our Royalties page and in our additional pages on Sound Recording Splits that break it down for you into different kinds of scenarios.

What Are Sound Recording Splits?

3 min read

October 8, 2026

Exploring what recording splits are, and how they're divided.

Splits are how ownership, rights and payments are divided when there is more than one owner of the sound recording.

Note that the described here are specific to and not . You can find more information about songwriter splits in the Songwriter topic.

A quick note on terminology

The terms splits and are often used throughout the industry to talk about how to divide both the ownership of a sound recording between different and the income from its commercial use. In general, we use the term splits throughout to cover both uses, but practice may vary in different contexts and different markets.

What are sound recording splits?

Sound recording splits are the percentage shares of and income generated by the sound recording that each and receives. This includes and other income.

Sound recording splits can vary based on many factors, such as who owns the recording, who is the main or secondary , the applicable country's copyright law, the terms of the agreements between all the parties involved in the sound recording, and which rights are managed by and what their respective rules are.

Owners of the sound recording, such as or , own the in that sound recording and hence will receive their share or split of any income generated for the .

The performers involved in the sound recording will typically receive royalties for their and thus a share of the income generated from uses of the sound recording.

You can learn more about rights and how royalties are generated for these in our Getting Credited and Paid topic.

There is no standard guideline for how sound recording income or royalties are split. CMOs often have default rules, sometimes set by law. These rules differ from one country to another. Agreements in place between the record label and the artists or other performers can also determine what splits are applied.

For more information about record labels, check out the Record labels page.

If you are an creating your own sound recordings, also known as a DIY artist, then you usually own all of the sound recording rights, and hence all income, in addition to some or all of the performer’s share, unless you agreed to share some of this with any other collaborators.

As a DIY artist, you will also be responsible for all the other activities a record label might typically carry out for their artists, such as clearing all rights from and , manufacturing and distributing both physical and digital formats, promoting, marketing, and your sound recordings for use in films, TV shows, and commercials, and more.

Look up our topics on Distribution and Marketing, Music Creators’ Rights, Rights Transfer and Licensing, and Scope of Protection to dive deeper.

Quiz

Test your sound recording splits knowledge

Video Credit: Amin Santosh, Parapix