iMusician vs. RouteNote – music distributors compared in 2025
With an update to their pricing tiers, we take another look at how music distributor iMusician stacks up against RouteNote in 2025.
We take a dive into what the music distributor offers artists and how much it really costs to get your music on to the world’s online stores and streaming services.
Pricing
iMusician
iMusician has recently switched up their pricing tiers, dropping their ‘Free’ model for a pay-per-release ‘Starter’ tier, along with launching a new $299 per year ‘AMPLIFY Pro’ tier. iMusician’s new tiers have new limitations on the number of releases and artists users can upload. Regardless of the tier you choose, with RouteNote you can upload an unlimited number of tracks, releases and artists, and on our Free model, it’s totally free!
With RouteNote, we have two basic distribution models. Of the options below, RouteNote Free is the only way to get your music on stores without paying upfront. We never lock our artists in and they can switch models, per release, at any time.
For labels managing over 15 artists using RouteNote Free, users won’t need to pay a penny upfront. Using iMusician, these same labels are required to pay $299 per year for their ‘AMPLIFY Pro’ tier.
Regardless of the tier, iMusician charges a 20% commission on social media earnings, such as YouTube Content ID and Instagram. With RouteNote, social media distribution is included at no extra cost, meaning you’ll earn 85% through our Free tier or 100% through our Premium tier.
- Starter
- $9 per release
- 10% commission
- 20% social media commission
- Limited features
- AMPLIFY
- $39/year
- 0% commission
- 20% social media commission
- 2 releases/year
- Limited features
- AMPLIFY+
- 2 artists – $79/year
- 5 artists – $99/year
- 15 artists – $199/year
- 0% commission
- 20% social media commission
- Unlimited releases
- All features
- AMPLIFY Pro
- $299/year
- 0% commission
- 20% social media commission
- Unlimited artists
- Unlimited releases
- All features
RouteNote
- Free
- 15% commission
- 15% social media commission
- $0/year
- $0/release
- Unlimited artists
- Unlimited releases
- All features
- Premium
- 0% commission
- 0% social media commission
- $9.99/year per release
- $10 per single
- $20 per EP
- $30 per album
- $45 per extended album
- Unlimited artists
- All features
Features
The number of artists, releases and features available to iMusician users vary based on the tier. At RouteNote, we believe the same tools should be accessible to all musicians, regardless of budget. RouteNote gives all paying and free users the same features.
| Feature | iMusician Starter | iMusician AMPLIFY | iMusician AMPLIFY+ | iMusician AMPLIFY Pro | RouteNote Free & Premium |
| Unlimited releases | ✓ | X | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Unlimited artists | ✓ | ✓ | X | ✓ | ✓ |
| YouTube Content ID | X | 10 tracks/year | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Revenue splits | X | Add-on | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Changes to release | X | $10 | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Custom label | X | $20 | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Please note, while the ‘AMPLIFY’ tier technically has unlimited artists, with a cap of just two releases per year, this is your limiting factor.
iMusician doesn’t distribute to many of the same partners as RouteNote, such as SoundCloud, CapCut, Claro música, Kuack Media Group and Nuuday, as well as leading Asian streaming services like AllSaints, Bugs!, FLO, Genie, Joox, Kanjian, LINE MUSIC, NAVER VIBE and Zing MP3.
Distributing with RouteNote is not exclusive and you have full control of where your music goes, meaning you can leave your releases live with another distributor, while filling the gaps with RouteNote. Alternatively, switching distributors completely while keeping your stats is super simple.
Conclusion
When distributing with iMusician, artists are immediately faced with choosing between saving money but significantly limiting the features or forking out $200-300 per year for many of the same features included on RouteNote’s Free tier.
With RouteNote Free you can distribute to all stores, get all features included and pay zero dollars, while you keep 85% of the revenue. Then when you’re ready to upgrade, earning 100% of your royalties with RouteNote Premium is a switch away.
Switch to RouteNote today and supercharge your online presence with no upfront costs!
