Which music distributors also promote your release?

Every music distributor puts your release in the stores. What each one does about who hears it varies a lot, and the word "promotion" covers very different things: a page of free tools, a program that pushes tracks inside Spotify, a marketing team you're invited to work with, or a campaign of posts written and published for the release.

This guide goes through what four well-known distributors offer, in their own words, and then what Audora does. Use it to match a distributor to the kind of help you want.

What "promotion" means at a distributor

Four kinds of help go under the name. Knowing which one you're being offered makes the comparison easier.

• Tools you run yourself. A pre-save page, a link page, ready-made graphics and short videos. You do the posting.
• Programs inside the streaming services. Spotify's Discovery Mode, for example, where selected tracks are played more often in radio and autoplay in exchange for a commission on those streams.
• A team that pitches. People who present your release to the streaming services' editors. This usually sits on a tier you're invited to or apply for.
• A campaign made for the release. The posts themselves, written, dated and published around release day.

The five at a glance

Sources: DistroKid's and TuneCore's pricing pages, UnitedMasters' plans page and Symphonic's pricing page, each read on November 11, 2026. Audora's own prices are on our pricing page.

DistroKid: free tools you run yourself

Every DistroKid plan comes with what it calls free goodies. For promotion, those are:

• HyperFollow, a page for your pre-save link, socials and videos.
• Promo Cards and Mini Videos, graphics and short videos made from your cover art for you to post.
• A Spotify Canvas generator that builds a looping video from a library of royalty-free clips.
• Playlist Spotlight and Wheel of Playlist, two DistroKid playlists on Spotify. Members vote tracks onto the first, and a spin of the wheel decides your place on the second.

The promoting itself stays with you. DistroKid's help center, on getting more streams, points artists to these tools and to pitching Spotify's editors themselves, and says that growing your following "through your own creative promotion will always serve you best in the long run." Its Ultimate plan adds a search engine for playlist contact info.

TuneCore: a program that picks tracks to push

TuneCore's answer is TuneCore Accelerator. Every TuneCore artist can opt in, and TuneCore's system then selects tracks for the programs inside it. Today those are Spotify Discovery Mode, YouTube Creator Music (which licenses your tracks for use in YouTube videos) and early access to new features on the platforms.

Opting in is free. TuneCore applies a 20% commission to the streams its active programs generate, and you keep the rest of your Spotify royalties as before. Being opted in doesn't guarantee a track is selected, you can't choose which tracks go in, and you can opt out at any time.

Outside Accelerator, TuneCore's artist services page lists offers from partner companies, among them Groover for pitching blogs and playlist curators, Playlist Push for playlist campaigns and Rotor for videos. Those are separate services with their own prices.

UnitedMasters: brand deals, and a team by invitation

UnitedMasters has two plans you can buy and one you're invited to, as listed on its artist plans page. DEBUT+ is $19.99 a year and SELECT is $59.99 a year. Both include an ArtistPages website and MasterLinks, shareable links for pre-saves and streams. SELECT adds access to what it calls UM Exclusives: sync deals, brand partnerships and perks you can apply for. Both plans pay out all of your royalties. YouTube Content ID is an extra at $4.99 a release, and UnitedMasters keeps 20% of what it collects there.

The marketing work sits on PARTNER, which is by invitation. That tier lists dedicated artist relations support, a personalized marketing and rollout strategy and editorial playlist pitching.

Symphonic: tools on Starter, a team on Partner

Symphonic's Starter plan is $29.99 a year. It pays out all of your streaming royalties, and its home page lists 70% of what YouTube, TikTok, Instagram and Facebook pay. It includes its Release Campaign Builder, and Symphonic says accounts can launch an ad or pitch to third-party playlists. Its marketing page adds a free pre-save feature, a promo mailer for your own mailing list, an ad campaign creator that starts at $10 a day and access to Spotify's Discovery Mode.

Marketing to the streaming services and playlist pitching are listed on Partner, a custom deal you apply for in which Symphonic takes a percentage. Its marketing page asks for a release's marketing details six weeks before release day and says releases submitted with them are pitched to the relevant services. The same page says: "We can't promise pick up… no one can."

Audora: the campaign comes with the release

On Audora, promotion is part of releasing. When you set up a release, the work around it is laid out with it:

• A pitch with every release. Every release goes out with a pitch for the people who market it to the stores, written from your answers about the song.
• A campaign of posts. Audora writes every post in your voice and says what each one needs. You go through them, change what you like and approve them, and each approved post goes out as planned, from five weeks before release day to two weeks after.
• The videos. Lyric videos, song teasers and behind-the-song clips made from your song with your own photos, logo, colors and font. Your first video is on us.
• Your own moves, dated. Your pitch to Spotify's editors, the pre-save and the Canvas each get a date on the release's calendar.
• Links for fans and press. A release link takes pre-saves before release day and opens the release from the day itself. A private listen link lets press and radio hear the record before it's out.
• Playlist adds. When a song is added to an editorial or listener-made playlist, Audora tells you.

TikTok, YouTube, Instagram (Stories included) and Facebook Pages post automatically, and nothing goes out until you approve it. Stories carry no link sticker, so your release link goes in your bio.

If you want paid ads as well, Boost is an optional ad campaign you can buy on a release, paid by card. Promotion shows the campaign in the app, with screenshots.

The exact steps for your release are in your account, each dated from the release day you pick. Audora keeps adjusting them, adding, dropping and retiming steps, as it learns what works best for its artists. What every track gets shows the full release.

How to choose

• You like making and posting your own content and want tools to speed it up: DistroKid's free tools cover the basics.
• Your catalog already has listeners and you want selected tracks pushed inside Spotify: TuneCore Accelerator is the program for that, for a commission on the streams it adds.
• You want brand and sync deals: UnitedMasters SELECT opens its deal listings to you.
• You have momentum and want a team: apply to Symphonic Partner, or build toward a UnitedMasters PARTNER invitation.
• You want the campaign written with you and published for each release, alongside the delivery: Audora does that.

For prices side by side, see DistroKid vs. TuneCore vs. CD Baby. For doing the promotion yourself, start with how to promote your music.