Music can create or destroy videos. The right music can set the mood and enhance the message, but it can also just be a pleasant sound for more peaceful moments in the video. The problem, of course, is the rights to this music.
Licenses are expensive, and the average person cannot afford to pay a license for different music for each video, and most videos do not bring in enough money to pay royalties. Fortunately, there is an alternative – free ambient music sites.
Free Music Archive
Free Music Archive is one of the leading providers of royalty-free music on the Internet. The company is working with Creative Commons and a number of other sources to get free music, resulting in a huge library that creators can use in their work.
There are different licensing terms for all songs; for example, some may ask you to assign a song to the original artist. The easiest way to search for music is by genre, although you can also search by curator.
FreeSound
FreeSound is great because not only does it provide free ambient music, but it also provides various sound effects, voices, and more. While you may be looking for specific music, the best way to navigate a website is using a tag cloud. Categories with the most posts are those with the most tag, whereas categories with fewer posts will have less choice.
While there is a lot of ambient music, FreeSound offers enough types of sound effects for you to create your own surround sound.
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Audio Library On YouTube
So many people have used YouTube as a music library like Spotify that YouTube has actually started to offer ways to make it easier. While none of these songs are available in the YouTube audio library, many are available.
You can search music by genre, instrument, duration, and even mood. There’s also a popularity filter that lets you see music based on what’s currently most popular, which is a great way to find music you know you’ll like, or to find lesser-known songs to highlight your video.
SoundCloud
You may know that SoundCloud is the outlet people use when they have fifteen minutes of Twitter fame, but it’s also a fantastic outlet for creators looking for ambient music. Most of the music on SoundCloud is licensed under Creative Commons, so you can use it if you follow the guidelines set by the artists.
You can search SoundCloud for music by artist, band, track, and podcast, which can be a little tricky if you’re trying to find a specific genre.
IncompeTech
IncompeTech is interesting in that it offers two options: a free and a paid version. If you want to list an artist, it’s free to use a song, but if there is a case where you can’t list a song for one reason or another, you can pay $ 30 for a standard license and use the music without attribution.
IncompeTech allows users to search by keywords, duration, genre, mood, themes and artists, making it one of the best options for finding specific types of music. You can also sort your search results by Recently Released, Most Popular, Length, and more.
BenSound
BenSound offers free ambient music tracks if you want to credit an artist, but also offers a Pro license if you’re willing to pay and don’t want to credit. BenSound may not have as many tracks as some of the other stores on this list, but it does have unique music that you won’t find elsewhere.
You can sort by type including Acoustic / Folk, Cinematic, Corporate / Pop, Electronica, Urban / Groove, Jazz, Rock, and World / Others. You can also search for a specific keyword.
Dig.ccmixter.org
Dig.CCMixter.org is one of the most popular music sites, claiming to have been used in over one million videos and games. The homepage divides music into three sections: instrumental music for films and videos, free music for use in commercial projects, and music for video games.
There are thousands of different tracks and songs you can browse, and a powerful tag-based search function that lets you sort by genre, instrument, and style. With much of the music being segregated, splitting options into sounds oriented towards movies or games helps you find what you’re looking for much faster.
If you’re looking for the best free ambient music, these seven sites are great places to start. You will find a myriad of songs and tracks to use in your content – just make sure to abide by the licensing agreements.
Where are you looking for royalty-free music? Were we missing any major sites? Let us know in the comments below.
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