guide
How to Upload Music to Audius (Step-by-Step)
explained by an impatient NYC carrier pigeon with human teeth
Putting a track on Audius takes about ten minutes and zero crypto. An impatient New York carrier pigeon — the original delivery service, now obsolete and somehow sporting human teeth — walks you through getting your music onto an open catalog, fast.
(Disclosure: I’m an artist on Audius, so I’m not a neutral party here.)
The short version: make an account at audius.co (an email is fine — you don’t need a crypto wallet), click Upload in the bottom-left, drop in your audio file, add a title, genre, and cover art, choose who’s allowed to hear it, and publish. It’s free, there’s no limit on how many tracks you post, and a normal upload is public and streamable by anyone with no wallet required. The pigeon will take it from here, and it’s in a hurry.
the pigeon, already annoyed
I’m a carrier pigeon. I’m from New York, I’ve got opinions, and for reasons nobody has ever explained, I’ve got human teeth. Back in the day, I was the upload: you tied a message to my leg and hoped I beat the hawks across town. It took hours, and sometimes I didn’t come back. Now you click a button and the whole world can hear your song before I’ve found a decent slice. So we’re not wasting that. Follow me, keep up, don’t dawdle. I’ve got places to be.
step 1: make an account
Go to audius.co and sign up. Use email. There’s a “sign up with MetaMask” option, but Audius itself says skip it unless you already live in crypto — email is the normal path, and you can add a wallet later if you ever want one. Pick a handle (it’s permanent, so choose well) and a display name (that one you can change). That’s the whole barrier to entry: an email address.
step 2: click upload
The Upload button sits at the bottom-left of the sidebar in the web app (there’s mobile upload too). You can post a single track, an album or EP, or a playlist. Uploading is free, and there’s no cap on how many tracks you put up.
step 3: drop in the audio
Drag in your file, and upload the highest-quality version you have. Audius keeps your lossless source file and streams at 320 kbps / 48 kHz, so a WAV or FLAC master gives the best result and lets you offer a clean download later. The ceiling is 200 MB per file; if a long mix runs over that, bounce it to a 320 kbps MP3 first.
step 4: fill in the details
Only two fields are required: a title and a genre. Everything else is optional but worth doing, because metadata is how people find you — mood, tags, a description, and a release date if you’re scheduling ahead. Add cover art while you’re here: at least 1000×1000 and square (JPG or PNG both work). (Songwriter credits and an ISRC live under the attribution options, if you’ve got them.)
step 5: choose who can hear it
This is the step worth slowing down for. A normal track is public — free, streamable by anyone, no wallet, no app install. You can also:
- keep it hidden (unlisted, link-only);
- make it follow-gated — still free, the listener just follows you first;
- tip-gated — unlocks when a fan sends you a tip;
- premium / for sale — you set a price in USDC, which fans can pay by card (it converts behind the scenes) or with crypto if they’d rather.
There are also a couple of crypto-native gates (collectible-gated, coin-holder-gated) if you ever want them. Free-to-everyone is the default, and the only options that ask for money are the ones you switch on yourself.
step 6: publish
Hit publish and it’s live on the open catalog. Your Artist Dashboard (it appears after your first upload) shows plays, reposts, and favorites. Fresh tracks get a visibility boost and the trending charts reset weekly, so uploading earlier in the week buys the longest window. Reposts, curator playlists, and accurate genre/mood/tags are how a new track gets found.
One straight note, because I don’t sugarcoat: Audius is on-network, not a distributor. It won’t push your song to Spotify or Apple; for those you’d still use a DistroKid-type service and run Audius alongside. It’s around a million tracks, well past its loudest hype years, steady rather than skyrocketing. What it gives you is somewhere to put music that anyone can reach directly, with no gatekeeper between you and a press of play.
hear what it sounds like
There’s a track playing in the corner of this page, uploaded to that same open catalog by the person whose site this is — they record as look out loren. Press play; that’s where your own track would end up. Now go on, I’ve got a slice to get back to.
