Growing an audience
Running the business
Both cover music licensing. Here is what separates them on price, billing, what you can take with you, and coverage.
| Soundraw | Thematic | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | From $16.99 | From $9.99 |
| Pricing model | Free trial, then paid | Free plan, paid tiers |
| Free tier | No | Yes |
| Billing | Monthly or annual | Monthly or annual |
| Free trial | Not stated | None |
| API | Not stated | Not stated |
| Data export | Not stated | Not stated |
| Their cut | Not stated | Not stated |
| Runs on | Web | Web |
| Covers | Music Licensing, AI Content Tools | Music Licensing, Stock Footage & Assets |
| Works with | Nothing in particular | YouTube, TikTok, Instagram |
| Founded | Not listed | Not listed |
| Reader rating | No reviews yet | No reviews yet |
| Live deals | None right now | None right now |
Generated music you keep the rights to
Soundraw writes the track rather than licensing one, so you pick a mood, a genre and a length and then adjust the arrangement until it fits the edit. Downloads come as WAV or as separated stems. Because nothing is licensed from a rights holder, there is no claim to dispute and no attribution to remember.
Our note
Take this over a stock library when the brief is background music and the risk you want gone is the copyright claim. The output is competent rather than memorable, which is the right trade for most edits and the wrong one for a title sequence.
Only on this side
Music from real artists, free if you credit them
Thematic pairs creators with musicians who want the exposure, so the free tier is a genuine trade rather than a trial: you use the track, the artist gets credited and found. Paying removes the credit requirement and adds the trending songs. Everything is cleared for monetised video, which is the whole point of using it over a random upload.
Our note
Start free and see whether the credit line bothers you, because for most channels it does not and the music is good. Uppbeat works the same way and has a bigger catalogue; Thematic has the better relationship with the artists on it.
Only on this side
Ratings are the average of reviews readers left. The facts are stated by each tool’s own listing and are not verified by CloutStack. How we make money.