By at present, nigh folks have said their goodbyes to concrete media. Although vinyl has made a chip of a comeback. This is because the early on 2000s ushered in a new era of music distribution in the form of digital download stores and streaming platforms.

Apple introduced the iTunes Store in 2003, and since and so, we've seen YouTube Music, Spotify, Pandora, Amazon Music, and many others grow in popularity. And if you lot're a music lover, SoundCloud is probable a name you lot've heard of as well.

In this article, nosotros'll discuss what SoundCloud is, exactly what the platform provides, and whether or not you'll need to pull your wallet out of your pocket to bask it.

What Is SoundCloud?

SoundCloud is an online audio distribution platform that was founded in 2007 by Alexander Ljung and Eric Wahlforss. They met while studying at the KTH Majestic Institute of Engineering science, a academy known for being one of the best schools in the world for informatics. Having bonded over a common beloved for music, they decided they wanted to create something similar Flickr or WordPress but for audio.

What started as a small customs for artists to promote their audio offerings has become a strong option for indie musicians to really get themselves out in that location. Post Malone, Chance the Rapper, and Kehlani are but a few mainstream music artists that originally started their careers on SoundCloud.

SoundCloud is now a streaming service, a distribution platform for new and upcoming artists, and an online customs for fans. But at its core, SoundCloud is all most letting you discover and listen to new music.

At the fourth dimension of writing, there are over 175 million registered SoundCloud users and over 200 1000000 uploaded tracks. You tin access SoundCloud on both the desktop website and mobile app.

Is SoundCloud Free?

The Soundcloud app on the home screen of an iPhone

Listening to music on SoundCloud online is completely free and you lot don't even need to create an business relationship to exercise and then. In order to upload and comment on tracks, however, you volition demand to register. Free users accept an upload limit of three hours of audio, and file sizes cannot exceed 4GB. Additionally, a track created by a gratis user can just be downloaded a maximum of 100 times.

If your account exceeds iii hours of uploaded sound, uploading will exist temporarily disabled. To go along uploading, you lot will need to make space for new uploads past either deleting older tracks to go under the free limit, or by upgrading to the Pro Unlimited paid plan.

What Is Repost by SoundCloud?

Repost is a minor upgrade to the costless basic SoundCloud business relationship. For $30/year, yous can unlock the following features:

  • Upload track artwork
  • Monetize rails plays
  • Get unlimited distribution across all major streaming services
  • Select which regions can play your tracks
  • Pitch your tracks to summit playlists
  • Promote on the SoundCloud Discover folio
  • Split acquirement with collaborators (eastward.thou. fellow ring or collective members)
  • Gain access to SoundCloud's hub of resource from music manufacture professionals
  • Get guaranteed 1-day support responses
A screenshot of the Soundcloud Discover page

What Is SoundCloud Pro Unlimited?

Users that pay $144/twelvemonth for SoundCloud Pro Unlimited take access to all of the basic business relationship functions, everything Repost has to offering, and a multitude of other features that yous might be interested in if you take music seriously:

  • Upload tracks that are up to six hours and 45 minutes long in length
  • No limit on number of uploaded tracks or how many times your tracks tin can be downloaded
  • Replace an already-uploaded runway with a new file (keeping the plays, stats, and comments untouched)
  • Be more than in-impact with your audience with advanced look at listener insights
  • Plough off commenting and viewing public stats
  • Get offered discounts from SoundCloud'south hardware and software partners
  • Access to exclusive Gobbler-SoundCloud suite of audio plugins
  • 24/7 live chat support

What Are SoundCloud Get and SoundCloud Go+?

You don't need to be a producer to improve your experience with SoundCloud. With SoundCloud Become for $4.99/month, you tin can salvage SoundCloud tracks for offline listening, and listen online without advertisements. SoundCloud Get+, which is priced at $9.99/month, gives y'all high quality sound, and admission to an exclusive library of A-list tracks that only Go+ subscribers have.

If you are a student enrolled at a Title IV degree-granting higher or university, you can get SoundCloud Go+ for fifty percentage off for upwards to four years.

Two adults listening to music and dancing together

SoundCloud Is a Great Place to Discover New Music

SoundCloud is a streaming service, distribution platform, and online community that yet delivers on its initial promise of allowing users to discover and share all kinds of music. Even with the rise of competing platforms, it has managed to stay on the pulse of trends and continue to provide a space for artists to promote themselves.

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About The Author

Jessibelle Garcia (268 Articles Published)

Nigh days, you can find Jessibelle curled up underneath a weighted coating in a cozy apartment in Canada. She is a freelance writer that loves digital art, video games, and gothic manner.

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