DistroKid vs Landr [An Honest Comparison From An Indie Artist]

If you're an independent artist looking to distribute your music, you might be wondering which is better when it comes to DistroKid vs Landr?

I have used both of these music distributors and I’ve compared them with many other distributors like TuneCore vs DistroKid, DistroKid vs CD Baby, and TuneCore vs United Masters.

I’m going to be as objective as I can in this post and share my honest opinion to help you choose the best music distributor for you but why trust me?

I’m a full-time independent artist and I’ve produced and released hundreds of songs. You can listen to some of them here. I also run a YouTube channel where I document and share my experiences as an indie artist. If you end up wanting to choose DistroKid at the end of this post, I can offer you a 7% discount that you can sign up with. If you’d like to choose Landr, I can offer you a 20% discount that you can use. If you sign up with these links, I get a tiny kick back and you get off to the right start.

I’ve come to learn when I’m comparing music distributors, the best categories to talk about are:

1. Cost

2. Features

3. Royalty Payments

4. Distribution Reach

5. User Experience

6. Customer Service

I will go deep in each of these areas giving you the information you need to make a strong decision for your next music release. If for some reason, you make a mistake, or you regret your decision, you can also switch music distributors, don’t worry about that.

Last thing I’ll say, don’t let the choice of a music distributor get in the way of releasing your music. This is the final step, and although and important one, learn fast and choose one, don’t spend days thinking about it.

Company Background

Let’s dive into the company backgrounds of DistroKid and Landr for a second. It can be helpful sometimes to know where the companies are coming from and how they were built up.

DistroKid was founded in 2013 by Philip Kaplan. They have been known for its affordability and user-friendly platform, DistroKid has quickly become a favorite among independent artists. It offers unlimited uploads and you can keep 100% of your royalties, making it a cost-effective solution for musicians at any stage of their career.

Landr started as an AI-powered mastering service in 2014 and later expanded into music distribution. Landr differentiates itself by combining professional mastering services with distribution, providing artists with a comprehensive platform to enhance and release their music.

Landr has also been extending their product offerings in the last couple of years beyond just mastering and distribution. They also offer a bundle of plugins and two DAWs (Ableton Live Lite & Cubase LE), all of which are combined with mastering and distribution. This is a pretty awesome deal if you use Ableton Lite or Cubase already but as you know for me, I won't be switching over until they have it available on Logic.

Quick Comparison Chart

If you’re looking for a quick answer when it comes to DistroKid vs Landr, you might find it in this chart here:

Cost

Let’s dive into cost and see what music distributor has a better bang for your buck, not necessarily who is cheaper, but where will your dollar last more.

DistroKid offers a straightforward pricing model with three main plans:

1. Musician Plan: $19.99/year, unlimited song uploads, and one artist/band.

2. Musician Plus Plan: $35.99/year, includes customizable label name, release date, and iTunes pricing, plus two artists/bands.

3. Label Plan: $79.99/year, includes everything in Musician Plus, plus up to five artists/bands.

I want to mention one thing you don’t see in the DistroKid pricing plans are their “add on” features. For example, you can choose to get YouTube monetization, mastering services, store automator, etc.

These all come at an extra cost and can quickly add up if you’re not careful. They have a lot of useful features that you can add on that provide lots of value but it’s important to have a look at how they might affect your annual fee. If you want to take a super deep dive into the DistroKid pricing plans, you might be interested in this post on what DistroKid plan is best.

Alternatively, Landr themselves have also written a document that sheds more light on DistroKid hidden fees.

Let's take a look at Landr's pricing model now. It's important to note that Landr has different pricing models for distribution and their Studio options. Landr Studio includes more add on options like mastering, samples, and plugins but we'll really be only diving in on the distribution pricing in this video. 

On their pricing page you can see that Landr offers a "pay per release" option or "unlimited" option. This really comes down to paying once or paying per month. For instance, if you know that you only ever want to release one song then choose the pay per release option. On the other hand, someone like myself, I release a lot of music so I'm more interested in the unlimited options. We'll discuss both below.

Landr pay per release plans:

1. Single: Simple and clean. 9 bucks for one single but you're looking at a 15% commission fee. 
2. Album: 20 bucks with the 15% commission fee. So, what's considered an album on Landr? Think of it as run time for your song. If it's less than 30 minutes, consider it an EP, more than 30 min, consider it an album. 

Now, if you want to release lots of music you'll likely be more interested in their unlimited distribution plans below.

1. Distribution Basic: Comes in at 23.99/year CAD. This is your first start and gets you everything you need to get you up and running as an independent artist for your first release. Also, you keep 100% of your royalties. At the time I'm writing this Landr does offer YouTube Content ID which is a steal! But be sure to double check on this as it noted with a "limited time" badge.
2. Distribution Pro: This is the step up for those artists who are more serious. For example, you might be interested in having better reporting on your releases or the option to reach out to a support team to get help. Both of these are examples you get with Distribution Pro at $44.99/year CAD.
3. Studio Essentials: This one is their mega option coming in at $99/year CAD. You get everything you want in distribution pro plus more. I think the biggest benefit to this plan is the samples and value of tools and plugins within the service. This is great if you're not signed up to anything yet like Splice. However, it's not an attractive option if you already own sound libraries or get your tracks mastered. For instance, I do my own mastering and I already have a ton of sound libraries so this wouldn't fit for me.

Who Wins When It Comes To ‘Cost?’

On face value, DistroKid does seem cheaper with their lower annual fees that include unlimited distribution. However, Landr provides a rich set of features that extend the value of your dollar. For example, you can get mastering services that are included which can sometimes cost you about $50 or $100 per song if you’re outsourcing it on your own.

In the end, both DistroKid and Landr let you keep 100% of your royalties on the unlimited plans. However, if you pay per release with Landr you're subject to a 15% commission fee. Although, DistroKid doesn't offer a pay per release plan.

This begs the question though, should you use Landr mastering services or master your own song? That’s a can of worms, that I don’t want to open yet but I do suggest trying out the Landr mastering services and comparing it to another master you’ve either done yourself or outsourced.

Comparing any music distributor against DistroKid is tough because of the unmentioned fees that can possibly add up to being a large annual fee. It's nice to know with Landr, what you see is what you get. Not a lot of add on fees.

Remember, if you end up taking the plunge with either of these distributors be sure to use my discounts here, 7% with DistroKid, or go with a 20% discount to Landr.

Features

The features that DistroKid and Landr provide might make or break the decision for you. This is because, at the end of the day, each distributor will do one thing: get your music uploaded to the streaming services. Whether that is getting your music uploaded to Apple Music or even getting your music uploaded to YouTube. Both distributors will do this. Where they differ will come down to the features that each of them offer.

DistroKid features:

•  Unlimited Uploads: Release as much music as you want.

•  Payment Splitting: Automatically split royalties among collaborators.

•  YouTube Content ID: Monetize your music on YouTube. (Extra fee from annual fee)

•  HyperFollow: Create pre-save links to promote upcoming releases.

•  Mastering service: Master your song with DistroKid

•  Marketing Goodies: They have a few Spotify playlists, a video generator, and photo generator.

If you want to take a deep dive on what all the DistroKid add ons and features are you might be interested in this post what are the DistroKid extras.

Let's move on to Landr now and talk about their features. However, it's important to note the difference between Landr Distribution and Landr Studio. Unlike DistroKid, which only offers distribution, Landr is a multi-service company offering distribution and other features for artists like samples, plugins, and mastering. So, to make it clear, I'll break down the features of Landr Distribution and then Landr Studio.

Last thing on this (and not to make it more confusing) but you can also get Landr Distribution if you pay for Landr Studio. That's what they market as the "best value". It is slightly confusing because Landr offers many different services you can choose from. In the list below, I'll highlight some of the good and bad but I'll also make note of what plan it's on.

If you're confused, don't be, they've laid it clearly out on their website here. It's neatly organized into tabs at the top where you can find something that fits just for you. At least they make it clear and up front! It's still a mystery to me that DistroKid does not showcase a pricing page on their website. You'll need to sign up to see it.

Landr features:

• Unlimited Uploads: Release as much music as you want (unless you sign up for the pay per release).

• Royalty Splits: Really valuable feature if you have collaborators on your song. Included in all the plans. I like this one a lot.

• AI Mastering: High-quality mastering for your tracks. Important to note that you can only get mastering when you sign up with a Landr Studio package like Essentials, Standard, or Pro. Also, with essentials you can only get MP3 masters which I personally don't believe is valuable. You really need the .wav file. You can get this but you'll need to be on a higher plan.

•  Sample Packs: Access to a library of samples but only if you're on the 

• Song Cover Licensing: This is a great feature to have as it's a real headache to organize your own cover license. Important to note, this is an extra fee of $15, one time.

Who Has Better Features?

I hate to sound like a broken record here but this will really depend on what kind of features you're looking for. Landr is the obvious choice when it comes to breadth of features. They offer a ton of value with samples, plugins, mastering, distribution, payment splitting, the list goes on! But to get all this, it is a bit more expensive since you'll need to sign up with Landr Studio.

In the end, I do think Landr has the better set of features.

Royalty Payments

Let’s talk about money. A subject a lot of people like to avoid talking about but it’s super important you’re clear on this. To start things off right, I want to show a picture that I created for one of my past distributor comparisons, talking about music royalties.

You’ll notice that your distributor only pays you a portion of the royalties that your song collects. You should consider signing up for services like Soundexchange which collect your performance royalties. Get signed up with your country’s PRO (Performance Rights Organization). I’m with SOCAN because I’m in Canada. Lastly, get a service like SongTrust which helps with your publishing administration. Some distributors like TuneCore offer this service as a feature, it’s something that DistroKid or Landr don’t offer but I do have a comparison on TuneCore vs Landr if you want to learn more.

Let’s talk about how DistroKid and Landr pay you your music royalties.

DistroKid and Landr allow you to keep 100% of your royalties on all plans. Expect if you're doing the pay per release with Landr.

For DistroKid, payments are processed quickly through PayPal transfers and you can withdraw your money at any time.

I do want to mention one thing first before we move on: tax. Tax can be ugly but it’s important you understand how tax can work with your royalties. DistroKid will withhold tax on your royalty income unless your country has a tax treaty with the United States. For example, I live in Canada and there is a tax treaty that Canada has with the US. This means that DistroKid does not withdraw any tax from my royalties. However, you might be reading this in a country that does not have tax treaties with the US. You can look on the IRS website here to see if you’re country has a tax treaty with the US.

Let’s move on to Landr now. Landr also lets you keep 100% of your music royalties unless you are on their pay per release plans. By the way, if you’re going to sign up with Landr, feel free to use my 20% discount.

I think owning 100% of your royalties is something you should definitely consider when you're looking at a music distributor and both DistroKid and Landr offer this. You might be asking, why give any of your royalties away in the first place? Well, some times a distributor might retain a percentage of royalties to offer you a service in return. For example, they might offer some promotional or marketing help to get your song out to the world. Consider it like sharing a piece of your song pie. If they have a piece, they will have more skin in the game to invest in your music. Although, most distributors are now offering that their customers keep 100% of music royalties since it's what the general population wants.

One thing I will mention for your knowledge, a cut in royalties does not mean a cut in copyright. No matter how much of your royalties you’re giving away, you will still retain 100% of the copyright of your song. That’s really important to remember.

The other thing is, usually the cut in royalties is a sign that the service is invested to make you a success. If they are getting a percentage of your sales, well, they would like it to be big! So they are invested in making you successful, that’s the hope. For instance, if you get signed to Universal Music, they will likely take up to 80% of your earnings. Now, that’s a lot! But in return, they can make you a big success! Even though you might be getting 20%, that could still be millions, in some cases.

Who Wins With Royalties?

DistroKid and Landr have the advantage of letting you keep 100% of your music royalties. So, we got a tie!

The one thing that DistroKid doesn't offer is a pay per release model which Landr does. However, if you go this route, you will need to pay a 15% commission fee.

If royalty payments are one of the big deciding factors for you, you might be interested in reading this post on what streaming services pay the most.

If you're going to dive into either of these distributors be sure to use my discounts here, 7% with DistroKid, or go with a 20% discount to Landr.

Distribution and Reach

Let's talk about the distribution networks and reach both DistroKid and Landr have. Let's start with DistroKid first.

DistroKid distributes music to over 150 digital stores and streaming services, including Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, and social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram. It's unfortunate that they don't advertise all of these sites on the DistroKid website  though. That's one of the things I dislike about DistroKid, they hardly offer any information on their website and are pushing you to sign up. I can empathize that they are trying to get sign ups but I think they can add more information to potential customers first. I'll get to more of this later.

Landr also distributes to over 150 platforms, ensuring your music reaches a broad audience. It's exactly the same as DistroKid, both releasing their music to 150+ stores and they don't give any more information besides that. It's not a problem if you are only interested in getting your music uploaded to Spotify or on social platforms like TikTok. However, if you're looking for niche or boutique streaming platforms, you might want to look at TuneCore because they showcase all their platforms they work with.

On top of normal distribution reach, Landr offers a platform of sync licensing opportunities that can help you find new revenue streams. However, these are not guaranteed.

Who Has Better Distribution?

There's no clear winner here, they both offer the same value. I will mention one thing, if you're looking for a smaller streaming platform to get your music on, you might want to reach out to their customer service teams to see if offer it.

User Experience

The design and experience of their websites and mobile apps should play a part in your decision making on what distributor is best for you. It's not the be all and end all but you'll be using these platforms a lot when you're uploading music. I upload a song to my Spotify page almost once a month, that's a lot of music. Not only that, I'm also in there a few times a month, making withdrawals, and looking at stats too. If The money is small at the beginning but, as an artist, I also subscribe to making money in a variety of different ways.

Let's start with DistroKid first and their main site. As I've said before, their main site is super simple. Almost too simple! There is hardly enough information to decide and therefore you're forced to sign up to get more information. It's okay though, it's free to sign up and you'll get more information on the inside. When you're looking to upload a song with DistroKid  it's super easy. I think they've made it the easiest out of all the distributors I've seen so far. Withdrawals are easy with PayPal and it's also easy to do things such as adding or fixing song credits. This is something I like to check on with each release as well.

Landr has a very sleek and modern interface. It's obvious to see when you arrive on their website. They offer tons of helpful information on their site, it's clear, it's concise. In my opinion, their website is much better designed than DistroKid's. However, it's not all about the website design. What about the internal app design of getting your music uploaded? Well, it's better too, in my opinion. Design is a subjective thing but I always find things to be much more intuitive on Landr than DistroKid.

Both DistroKid and Landr also offer impressive mobile apps to manage your music.

Here's a screenshot of the DistroKid mobile app on the music page:

Here's a screenshot of the Landr mobile app on the mastering service page:

Who Has The Better Design?

I would say both DistroKid and Landr match up in their quality of upload designs but in general, I prefer Landr user experience and design. Landr seems to pack in more with their site, where DistroKid seems to be much more simple, too simple? It could be ideal for someone super beginner and want a hassle-free experience but I believe Landr feels more experienced. Think of DistroKid as a Honda Civic and Landr as a Lexus Toyota. Both are going to get you there but one of them is a far more comfortable ride.

Customer Service

Let's talk about customer service for a brief moment. It's important. Especially at the beginning of your career as an independent artist. You're going to have questions about your release, how long does it take? How do I add credits? How do I change my release? What's an ISRC code?

There's lots of things to learn at the beginning and you'll be either getting answers from people like myself on YouTube or you'll be reaching out directly to DistroKid or Landr customer service teams.

DistroKid provides customer support primarily through email and an extensive FAQ section. They have a chat bot as well that you can use but to be honest I don't think it's very good. On top of this, they also offer a helpful community forum where users can seek advice and share experiences. So, in general, there's a ton of help online that you can get from people because DistroKid has had millions of users.

Landr also offers customer support via email too but they offer chat too. Their support team is known for being responsive and helpful, providing assistance with both distribution and mastering services. 

Who Has Better Customer Service?

It's a clear winner for me that Landr has better customer service. This is quite clear on their site too as they mention this as one of their big selling points, it's hardly existent on DistroKid's site. So, keep this in mind if this is something you need to have.

Final Thoughts On DistroKid vs Landr

Both DistroKid and Landr offer valuable services for independent artists. There's a ton of competitive overlap in their services but at the core, in my opinion, they cater to different artists.

It goes like this:

•  DistroKid is great for new artists seeking a straightforward and super simple approach to distribution, it's cheap (but you have to manage the add on costs) and you keep 100% of their royalties.
•  Landr has as similar "cheap" option for distribution but it's also perfect for those looking for a comprehensive platform that includes professional mastering, sample packs, plugins, and a ton more features. Even though it comes with higher costs for these mentioned options, you're getting more bang for your buck. It might be just perfect for you as an up and coming artist but it might be too much.

To be honest, both get the job done. They get your music on the streaming services. However, they come at it in different ways. Consider your specific needs and goals as an artist to determine which platform is the best fit for you. If you're going to ask me what I would do in your shoes? My honest suggestion would be to start with Landr. Remember, if you do, I can offer you a 20% discount on signup

Good luck on your music journey, and feel free to reach out with any questions.