Pre Release Audio Specs

Ready to release your music and getting it prepped for the public? Here you will find an audio specifications guide, to ensure your music is compliant.

Loudness and LUFS

Part of mastering is assessing the loudness of a track and making sure it is compliant for various digital environments. The loudness is measured in LUFS (loudness units, full scale). Below are current specifications for popular streaming platforms. However, please keep in mind this can change at any time at the discretion of the streaming platform. It is recommended to have your master sounding as good as possible, without losing impact due to sensitivity around meeting loudness standards.

Apple Music

Apple Music has a -16 LUFS recommendation. They have also enabled normalization which will turn quieter songs up (without peaking).

Spotify

Spotify works with a reference level of -14 LUFS but also has felxibility for users to select an additional level of -19 LUFS and -11 LUFS.

Youtube

Youtube works with -14 LUFS and will also apply normalization, to turn quieter songs up.

SoundCloud

SoundCloud does not have set specifications and also does not use normalization. Allowing users to upload directly to the platform without any form of aggregation to the sound. If you are concerned on best practices for SoundCloud specifically we have sourced a great article here.

Pandora, Amazon Music, Tidal, Deezer

Pandora works with -14 loudness as a guide but doesnt measure specifically in LUFS. Deezer uses -15 LUFS, Amazon Music and Tidal both use -14 LUFS. Amazon and Tidal also use normalization, however Tidal is only across albums.