How Lay compares to other distributors
Four comparisons: DistroKid, TuneCore, CD Baby and LabelGrid. Each one starts with the answer, then puts the numbers in a table, then shows where the other side is the better choice.
Lay vs DistroKid
A yearly fee from 23.99 euro and 0 percent of royalties, against $0 and a 30 percent share.
Lay vs TuneCore
Yearly plans from $24.99 with no commission, but 20 percent on social media use.
Lay vs CD Baby
One-time fees per release, 9 percent of royalties and weekly payouts, against a 30 percent share.
Lay vs LabelGrid
Catalog plans from $99 a year with 85 to 95 percent retention, against a single-artist account.
How these pages are made
- Every competitor fact comes from the competitor’s own pricing page, terms or help pages, read on the day the page names. The link and the date sit under each comparison.
- What a competitor does not document is not on the page. There is no row built from a review site, a screenshot of a forum or a memory of last year’s price.
- The money arithmetic is ours, and it is labelled as ours. It uses the published prices and nothing else, so you can redo it with your own royalty figures.
- Each page names the rows where the other service is better, including the ones where it is better than Lay. A comparison that always ends in our favour would not be worth reading.
Lay’s own numbers come from the plans and prices we publish. Starting with Lay means writing an application: apply for an account and we read it ourselves.