Music and Sound
Music generation is the corner of this field where the legal picture matters more than the output quality — and where it has changed most dramatically. If you intend to publish, read the licensing note below before you fall in love with a tool.
The 2026 licensing situation, briefly, because it determines which tool you can use:
- ElevenLabs Music was trained on licensed catalogue from the start, through deals with Merlin and Kobalt. It is currently the cleanest option for commercial release.
- Suno has settled with some major labels and committed to retiring models trained on unlicensed music, but remains in significant litigation. Check its current terms yourself before commercial use.
- Udio settled and pivoted into a closed fan-remix platform — you can create there, but you cannot export, distribute or use the results in outside projects. Not a production tool any more.
- Soundraw, Mubert and Artlist are built as royalty-free production libraries with straightforward commercial licences, which is often exactly what a video project actually needs.
ElevenLabs Music
Trained on licensed catalogue from day one via label and publisher deals, and marketed explicitly as cleared for commercial use. The same company's voice and sound-effects tools are the industry standard, so it also fits neatly if you already generate voiceover or SFX. Currently the safest choice if the track is going to be published.
Suno
The most capable and best-known music generator — full songs with vocals, lyrics and structure, across essentially any genre, from a short description. Extraordinary output. Also the platform with the most unsettled legal position, so read its current commercial terms yourself rather than trusting a summary.
Soundraw
Purpose-built for creators who need a soundtrack rather than a song: choose genre, mood, length and instrumentation, then adjust the arrangement section by section. Clear royalty-free licensing and precise control over length, which matters when you are scoring to picture.
Mubert
Generative royalty-free music with both a simple interface and an API. Good for background beds, streams, podcasts and long-form ambience where you need a lot of usable music and no licensing questions.
AIVA
Focused on emotional and cinematic scoring for film, games and trailers, with more compositional control than most and the ability to export stems and edit in a DAW. The choice when you need to score to a scene rather than generate a track.