How To Upload Music To YouTube
Sep 16, 2022
YouTube is the second biggest search engine in the entire world. Did you know that over 500 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every single minute?
Yes, I said minute, that's wild! You're reading this post because you want to learn how to upload music to Youtube. You want to be part of the enormous engagement on the platform. Me too, I've uploaded over 625 videos to youtube and most of it is music.
There are two different ways you can upload music to YouTube and we'll be covering both in this post:
1. Uploading Music To YouTube For Free
2. Uploading Music To Youtube Music
The first way, uploading music to YouTube for free, is fast and easy. Everyone can do it. Here is an example song that is uploaded this way. The second way, uploading music to YouTube Music takes a little more energy and is not necessarily free. However, I will mention some free options.
What is the difference between YouTube and YouTube Music?
Both of these platforms are run by Google and even though they both say YouTube, they're quite different. There's also added confusion because you can have both music videos and lyric vides on YouTube. In that case, why would anyone release their music to YouTube music?
That's a great question. There are likely millions of people who listen to music on YouTube and they do it all for free. On the other hand, there are also millions of other people who listen to YouTube Music too. Therefore, I suggest you cover both ways of uploading your music to YouTube. Upload so people can listen to it for free but also make sure to upload your music to YouTube Music so people who pay for YouTube Music can listen there as well. If I say YouTube one more time, I might explode!
You can think of YouTube Music as very similar to Spotify or Apple Music. They are paid streaming services, where you can search, like, and download music by paying a monthly subscription. The best way to tell the difference between YouTube and YouTube Music is by going to their websites to visually see the difference:
You'll notice how YouTube Music looks completely different than YouTube. That's because it is! You also might notice that you'll have to pay for YouTube Music. About 9.99/month depending on your country.
Now that we know that difference between both platforms. Let's dive into getting your music uploaded to Youtube and Youtube Music.
Uploading Your Music To YouTube [FREE]
To get started you will need a gmail account. Not surprising since YouTube is owned by Google. To get started, go to YouTube, and click on "sign in" in the top right corner.
On this page, click on "Create account". This will run you through the process of creating a new gmail account. Go through the steps of creating an account and then meet us in the next section. If you already have a gmail account, simply sign in.
Now that you have a gmail account, you can use the same login information for your Youtube account. Therefore, go to YouTube and sign in to YouTube. Once you're signed in, you'll want to navigate to the YouTube Creator Studio. This is where you will upload your music for free to YouTube.
The first time you login to the Youtube Creator Studio, you'll see your Youtube Dashboard, like this:
It's normal that you have 0 views and 0 subscribers. It won't stay like that for long!
In order for you to upload your music to Youtube, we will need to upload it as a video file.
However, the video does not necessarily need to be a video. That's weird to read out loud. Let me explain more... The video can be a picture of the album art, or you can create a video with royalty free video footage from Pexels. Here are two examples of my songs that I uploaded to YouTube, one with the album art, another with a vinyl showcase that I designed. You have options. Of course, you can also create a music video to upload to YouTube as well.
If you have your video file ready, navigate to "Upload Videos". You can find this button on your Youtube Dashboard on the top right. You'll also see a blue button in your dashboard, see below:
On the next screen, find your music on your computer. You can also drag and drop it on the screen below.
Notice that if you try to upload your .MP3 or .WAV song files to YouTube, you will get an invalid format error, take note of the image below. This is because YouTube does not support music files unless they are in video files. If you don't know how to create a video file for your music, skip to the next section.
Let's assume you have a video file for your music to get on YouTube and it's ready to upload. This is the screen you'll see below. Take note of a couple things. First, notice the top timeline. Let's go through each stage in the timeline.
Details
Here is where you can start to fill in the details to your music. For example, your artist name, song title, credits, or lyrics. You can put anything you'd like in the description. You can also put a link to find the song on other streaming services as well. I do this with my music, here's an example.
The time left to have your video uploaded will be shown at the bottom. The faster your internet upload speed, the faster your video will upload.
On the details page, you can also upload a video Thumbnail, add video tags, and tell YouTube if your music is made for kids or not.
Video Elements
The video elements page involves Subtitles, End Screens, and Cards. If you'd like you could add subtitles to your music in any language. I also recommend adding an end screen and cards.
An end screen is a video recommendation that appears within the last 20 seconds of your video. It will help increase your watch time as viewers can click on another song to watch from you. For example, notice what happens within the last 20 seconds of this video. A new video recommendation appears which is a playlist of all my music.
Cards are also good to have. They allow the viewer to click in the top right hand corner of the video to get more information about. This is a great spot to link to other relatable music you have. Look at the same video, and click in the top right, notice how I also link to more of my music.
Checks
This is where YouTube will check if you are the copyright owner of your music. This shouldn't be a problem if you've created the music yourself.
Visibility
In this section, you can choose to publish your video right now by going Public. You could also keep it as Unlisted or Private until you're ready to release your music. I would typically keep my music as unlisted until my song has been released on all platforms.
You're Live On YouTube
Once you set Public, you're live on YouTube and you've officially uploaded your music to the YouTube platform. You can always making further edits by going to your YouTube Dashboard and clicking edit.
How Do You Make A Video File With Your Music?
In this section, I will teach you how to take your .MP3 or .WAV song file and turn it into a video file. I recommend using a .WAV file as it's higher quality. I also recommend to make sure that your song is properly mastered. This is going to make sure the song is loud enough to be on YouTube.
Things You Will Need:
- Your .WAV song file
- Your Album Art
- A Movie Editing Software (iMovie)
Make sure that have everything listed above before you move on to this step. By the way, you can use any movie editing software you'd like. I use Final Cut Pro, however, iMovie is a great free option to use with Mac, it gets the same result. For the purpose of this example, I'll be using iMovie.
Step 1
Open up iMovie and start a new project.
Step 2
Drag your album art into the project timeline.
Step 3
Drag in your .WAV file underneath your album art.
You'll have to extend your album art to match the length of your song. To do this, click and drag from the furthest right of your album art. Take note of the image below and how my .WAV file (in green) lines up to my single artwork.
Step 4
Now it's time to preview your song in video format before you upload it to YouTube. Make sure that your dimensions are appropriate and the start and end times line up.
Dimension Troubleshooting
If you're having trouble getting the proper dimensions in iMovie then you may need to crop your artwork. In order to do this, click your artwork in the project timeline and you'll notice the options light up above your artwork. Take note if the image below.
Step 5
It's time to export your song as a video file from iMovie. Navigate to the top right: File > Share > File
You'll notice that you can also directly export to YouTube & Facebook. I prefer not to do this because I like to have the video file on my computer so I can reference it later. I also like to share the video file to my Instagram and TikTok accounts too.
Name your song video file. You can copy my export settings below for the best quality. After you press, Next, you'll choose the location you'd like to export the file to.
You're finished! You've just created your song into a video file and you're now ready to upload to YouTube for free. Go back up the previous section in this post where I explain the steps on uploading your song video file to your YouTube account. In the next section, I will teach you how to get your music uploaded to YouTube Music.
How To Upload Music To YouTube Music
In this section, I will teach you how to get your music uploaded to YouTube Music. Notice how YouTube Music looks very different than YouTube. That's because it is very different. YouTube Music is a paid music streaming service. Very comparable to Spotify or Apple Music.
Uploading your music to YouTube, like we talked about above, will not get your music on YouTube Music. They are completely separate.
For example, here is my music on my YouTube Channel, take note of the image below. It's likely something you're familiar with. It's an ordinary YouTube channel page.
Now here is my YouTube Music Channel, take note of the image below. Notice how completely different it is. This is YouTube music and in this section, I'm going to show you how you can get your very own profile like this.
Let's break down the steps of getting your music on YouTube in series of steps. Each step will be quite straight forward but some steps will be bigger than others.
Step 1
Sign up to a music distributor. I can offer you a 20% discount to TuneCore or a 7% discount with DistroKid. If you're scratching your head right now and thinking, "what is a music distributor?" That's okay, keep reading below, if you already know what music distributor is, get signed up to one, and meet us in the next step.
What Is A Music Distributor?
You can think of a music distributor as the middleman between you and YouTube Music. They also can act as the middleman for you to upload your music to TikTok or upload your music to Spotify. In fact, mostly all major streaming platforms.
Now that you know they sit in the middle between you and YouTube Music. In a nutshell, you give them your song. They take your song and upload it for you to YouTube Music. In return, they pay you the music royalties that are generated on YouTube Music.
For this service, they will charge you a monthly or annual fee. If you'd prefer not to pay a fee for distribution then you might be able to give them a share of your music royalties instead. This is also known as free music distribution.
There is no way around getting your music uploaded to YouTube Music without using a music distributor. They are the gatekeepers. You'll have to decide on one that works best for you. Here is a great post comparing TuneCore vs DistroKid.
Step 2
Prepare the information you're going to need to upload to your distributor. For the purpose of explaining how to get your music on YouTube Music, I'll be sharing some screenshots of TuneCore. This is the music distributor I use. You don't have to use TuneCore but if you'd like to, you can get a 20% discount here.
When I say "prepare the things" to have ready for your music distributor, these are the things I'm talking about:
Your Song
You'll need to have a .wav file of your song in either 16bit or 24bit. Distributors will not accept MP3 files.
It's also very important that your song is properly mastered. This is because you'll want to make sure you can compete on YouTube Music in terms of loudness. If your song is not mastered, it might be too quiet. Nobody likes "too quiet".
Your Artist Name
You must have your Artist Name figured out. If this is your first release on YouTube Music then YouTube Music won't know about you yet. That's why it's often better to choose a name that is unique.
If you choose a name that is too popular, it could leave room for error that YouTube might release your music to the wrong artist. I've seen it happen before but don't get too overwhelmed if you have a popular name. For example, I have a side project under the name Palma and I haven't experienced any problems yet, and that's quite a popular name.
Your Artwork / Album Cover
You won't be able to upload your single to YouTube Music unless you have artwork. There are many free tools that you can create artwork. For example, I use Canva or Figma to create mine. I have a few friends that spend a lot of time and energy on their artwork because it's important to them.
For me, it's not so important but I do want it to look professional. My artwork usually consists of a photo and text. I like to keep it simple and clean. You can see my artwork examples on YouTube.
Your Scheduled Release Date
This is something you'll want to have prepared in advance. When would you like to release your single? In a couple weeks? A month?
I recommend planning at least 2 weeks out. If you're trying to get your single uploaded to YouTube music in 1-2 days, that's fast. There might not be enough time for your music distributor to get it uploaded to YouTube Music. Give them at least 2 weeks of prep time. In general, TuneCore is quite fast.
Prepping at least 2 weeks out will give you a chance to prepare a small promotion campaign. You can share a post to your audience that includes the date of release to build excitement.
By the way, scheduling your release date might be a feature that is not included in your distribution plan. For example, on TuneCore, if you sign up to release your music on the Free plan, you will not be able to schedule your release date. Instead, your music will go live whenever it gets uploaded. With TuneCore, and most other distributors, scheduling your release date is a feature that usually only comes on paid plans. You can check out the TuneCore pricing page for more information.
Songwriting Credits
It's important that you give everyone credit that they deserve from your song. Are you the only writer or did you have a co-writer? Did you have a producer? Or did you feature someone in your song? TuneCore, or whatever distributor you end up using, will ask you who is involved in your song:
Step 3
Choose the streaming services that you would like to upload your music on. In this case, be sure to choose YouTube Music as your preferred streaming service to release your music.
You can also add multiple streaming platforms at this step. Would you like to get your music uploaded to Spotify or uploaded to TikTok as well? You can have this accomplished at this step with your distributor. I should mention though, that the platforms you'd like to distribute on will be depend on your distribution plan.
Step 4
Now is the time to do a final review of your single before you finish the upload process. Double check that all your information is correct. Triple check your artist name, song file, release date, and artwork. That wouldn't be great if you accidentally uploaded the wrong version of your song.
After everything looks good. Click next and complete the upload process. Your distributor will let you know when your music will be available on YouTube Music. You can be confident that if you've given them more than 2 weeks lead time until your release that it will be available on this date.
If you've made a mistake on your release information or you are uploading the single to YouTube Music for the second time then you will want to double check two types of codes. The ISRC code and the UPC code. There's no problem on making edits after you publish your release, however, it's important that you follow a few details. Here is a great video tutorial on how to switch music distributors.
Can I Have My Song On YouTube and YouTube Music?
It's completely fine to have your song on YouTube and YouTube Music. This often happens because artists have their own channel pages. For example, this is my Charles Cleyn YouTube Channel page. On the other hand, this is my Charles Cleyn Topic Page. Notice how completely different they are.
You'll also notice that I have the same songs on each. For instance, my song Better is on my youtube channel page but the same song is also on my topic page. But why?
This is because when you upload your music to YouTube Music, your distributor will automatically create a topic page.
Can You Merge Channel Pages and Topic Pages?
The answer is yes and it's quite simple to do, it just take a bit of administration work. Essentially, you'll have to email YouTube, prove to them that you own both channels and they'll merge them for you. Here is a great post on merging channel pages and topic pages.
Final Thoughts On Uploading To YouTube Music
Getting your music uploaded to not only YouTube but YouTube Music will help you expand your reach with the hope of collecting more fans to build your audience.
YouTube is the second biggest search engine in the world and one of the most visited websites. It would be shame to miss out on this opportunity. I'd love to help you learn more about releasing music and building a fan base. I recommend checking out my free 5 must try music marketing tactics.
