Phonorecords V filings land, and the 2028–2032 streaming rates are in play

The fight over what streaming services pay songwriters for the next five years has formally started. On Monday, October 5, the parties to Phonorecords V filed written testimony and rate proposals with the US Copyright Royalty Board, Music Business Worldwide reported. The rates cover on-demand streaming in the US from 2028 through 2032. The filings opened discovery too.

One proposal is already public. The Songwriters Guild of America, Word Collections, Eminem’s publisher Eight Mile Style and Nashville songwriter George Johnson back a flat mechanical rate of $0.0030 per interactive stream or limited download in 2028, adjusted for inflation each year after, Digital Music News reported. The Society of Composers & Lyricists and Music Creators North America support it. Bernie Taupin, Elton John’s longtime lyricist, submitted testimony in favor.

That is a different animal from the system in place now. Today’s headline rate is a percentage of a service’s US revenue, rising to 15.35% by 2027 under the Phonorecords IV settlement, with per-subscriber minimums and a prong tied to what services pay record labels. A per-stream flat rate would not move with a service’s revenue or pricing.

Who is on which side

Spotify, Apple, Amazon, Google and Pandora are participants, and the Digital Media Association speaks for the streamers. Its members also include Tidal, Qobuz and Feed.fm, and Tidal is one of the services that plugs into DJ software. Opposite them sit the National Music Publishers’ Association and the Nashville Songwriters Association International, filing jointly as the Copyright Owners. The three major labels, filing together, and the independent-label group A2IM are in the case as well.

DIMA’s statement named no rate. It stuck to the growth story: NMPA data shows US publishing revenue up more than 30%, from $5.6 billion in 2022 to $7.3 billion in 2025. “DIMA joins its member companies in looking forward to a timely resolution,” said president and CEO Graham Davies. The last two rounds went differently. Phonorecords III went to a CRB ruling that raised the headline rate from 10.5% to 15.1%, and Phonorecords IV ended in a settlement.

A settlement is still possible here. If one doesn’t come, a hearing starts March 22, 2027, and the CRB’s initial determination is due by December 17, 2027.

Bundling is the sideshow that isn’t

The bundle clause is what the publishers are angriest about. Phonorecords IV lets services pay a lower rate on bundles than on standalone music subscriptions. Spotify used that in March 2024, reclassifying Premium as a bundle that includes 15 hours of audiobook listening a month. Amazon has since launched a similar music-and-audiobook bundle.

The NMPA’s Danielle Aguirre told its June meeting that bundling had cost songwriters and publishers almost $480 million since 2024, citing Spotify’s own estimates. She said it has cut what Spotify and Amazon pay in royalties by around 30%. The NMPA has projected losses of more than $3.1 billion through 2032 if it is not reversed.

The Mechanical Licensing Collective sued Spotify over this in May 2024. The case was dismissed in January 2025, then reopened in part that September. On September 1, 2026, Judge Analisa Torres denied the MLC’s request for an immediate appeal, though she struck Spotify’s “unclean hands” defense. The NMPA and NSAI have also asked the CRB to subpoena documents from that litigation. Spotify opposes the request.

Downloads are on a separate track

If you still buy files, the download side looks calmer. In June the majors, A2IM, the NMPA, NSAI and the Music Artists Coalition proposed keeping the current structure for physical, permanent downloads and ringtones through 2032. The mechanical rate on a download is 13.1 cents per song or 2.52 cents per minute, whichever is larger, in 2026. It would keep rising with inflation, and the record companies and A2IM project about 13.7 cents in 2028.

Not everyone signed. The SGA and Word Collections say the deal skips inflation for 2021 and 2022 and effectively resets the rate to 12 cents. The CRB has not decided whether to adopt it, and last month it split those formats off from the streaming case and asked the settling parties for more information about common ownership between labels and publishers.

Nothing in the filings says what any outcome does to subscription prices or to the catalogs available in DJ-integrated streaming. That is the thing to track. Streaming rates set in 2027 will shape the margins of the services you may be pulling tracks from in 2028 and beyond, and a lower bundle rate or a flat per-stream fee would hit those margins very differently. Watch for a settlement before the March hearing.