Music licensing for fitness studios
The question every studio owner eventually asks: "Can I just play my Spotify in class?" The short answer is no. [Consumer accounts from Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube Music, Amazon Music, and Pandora do not cover commercial use in a fitness facility](https://www.custom-channels.com/blog/music-licensing-gyms-ascap-bmi-sesac-gmr/); their terms of service are for personal listening. Playing copyrighted music in a business is a public performance, and public performances require licenses. Here is how the system works and what it costs.
Who collects, and for what
Performing rights organizations (PROs) license the public performance of songs on behalf of songwriters and publishers. In the US there are four that matter: ASCAP and BMI, which together cover the bulk of commercial music; SESAC, an invitation-only, for-profit PRO with a smaller but significant catalog; and GMR, small but well-represented in popular fitness playlists. A license from one does not cover the others' catalogs, which is why businesses that play mainstream music typically end up licensing ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC together.
The distinction that trips up studios: background music in a lobby is licensed differently, and often more cheaply, than class music. Group classes such as spin, yoga, HIIT, and dance may require separate or additional licensing because the movement is tied to the music; the music is part of the product, not ambiance. If you run spin, dance, or barre, assume class-use licensing applies to you.
What it costs
The good news: for small studios the fees are modest, especially compared to the exposure. Published examples: ASCAP offers a low-cost premises license for yoga classes around $68/year, and SESAC's yoga instructor and studio licenses run $92-$228/year. ASCAP's lowest annual fitness fees work out to under $2 a day, and fees generally scale with square footage, capacity, locations, and how music is used. A small studio licensing all three majors is typically in the several-hundred-dollars-a-year range, a legitimate deductible business expense.
The bad news for ignoring it: statutory copyright damages run from hundreds to tens of thousands of dollars per song, and PROs actively pursue fitness businesses, with yoga studios among the targets. PRO field agents do visit and document unlicensed use. This is a cheap risk to eliminate.
Your realistic options, cheapest exposure first
- 1. License the PROs directly. Contact ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC, describe your business honestly (class formats, capacity, locations), and pay the annual fees. Full mainstream catalog, fully legal.
- 2. Use a commercial music service. Business-licensed streaming services bundle PRO coverage into a subscription and behave like a normal streaming app. Often the simplest path for lobby music; confirm in writing that the plan covers instructor-led classes, not just background use.
- 3. Royalty-free and PRO-free music. Libraries of fitness-ready music sold specifically for class use, with no PRO obligations. Cheapest fully-legal route; the trade-off is that members do not hear songs they know.
- 4. A mix. Many studios run royalty-free playlists in most classes and license properly for the formats where mainstream music is the experience.
What is not an option: consumer streaming plus hoping. It combines a terms-of-service violation with copyright exposure, and it is the single most common compliance gap in independent studios.
The 30-minute fix
List where music plays in your business (lobby, each class format, livestreams, on-hold). Decide per surface: PRO licenses, business streaming service, or royalty-free. Get quotes from the three majors for your square footage and formats, then calendar an annual re-check as your class mix changes. Note that livestreamed and on-demand class recordings raise separate sync-licensing questions that PRO performance licenses do not cover; keep recorded content on royalty-free music unless you enjoy expensive conversations with lawyers.