List of online music databases

This is a list of online music databases, as well as including a list of sites that currently provide free and paid-for on-demand music as a streaming media. A primary unit of many of these two types of sites is the tracks which is often referred to in the marketplace simply as a song.

Contents

Online music databases

Below is a table of online music databases that are largely free of charge. Note that many of the sites provide a specialized service or focus on a particular music genre. Some of these operate as an online music store or purchase referral service in some capacity. Among the sites that have information on the largest number of entities are those sites that focus on discographies of composing and performing artists.

Database Services No. of tracks No. of releases No. of artists Notes License Full free access
Allmusic Music information and reviews ~20,000,000[1] ~2,200,000[1] Song samples only
BestEverAlbums.com Database and community 180,000 [2] 15,000 [2] 7,000 [2] Song samples only
Choral Public Domain Library
Decibel Database and API of physical & digital products, venues, photos, artists, participants, composers, movements, labels, publishers and rights. 12,000,000 [3] 301,000 Multi-lingual, Global Coverage
Discogs User-generated database of physical/digital releases, artists, and labels. Marketplace. 21,500,000 [4] 2,500,000 [5] 1,900,000 [5]
Encyclopaedia Metallum A heavy metal encyclopedia with information, complete discography, links, images, and reviews. ~1,200,000 [6] ~74,000 [6] ~170,000 [6]
freedb Identification service for CDs GPL
The Freesound Project repository of Creative Commons-licensed audio samples CC Sampling Plus
Gracenote Identification service for CDs and other media ~100,000,000 [7] ~8,000,000 [8] 1 billion "submissions" [9]
International Music Score Library Project Music scores and parts, mostly scanned from publications now in the public domain; some recordings 6,500 (150,000 scores) 6,700 composers, 162 performers [10] PD/CC-BY-NC-SA
Internet Archive Huge live music archive and host for hundreds of free music netlabels ~200,000[11] CC/PD Yes
iLike music download and sharing
Jamendo free full-length music download CC/Free Art License
Jango advertising-supported Internet radio and social networking Yes
Last.fm Internet radio and music community website. 12,000,000[12] Automatically creates online library/collection of listened to music and generates recommendations
LyricWiki Lyrics wiki on Wikia
MAQAM Largest Database of Arabic and Middle Eastern music artists, tracks, and albums. 20,000 1,200
Megarock Radio Streaming music service, reviews, interviews and news. 23,000 1,000 Full free access.
Metacritic Album reviews
MetroLyrics Lyrics lookup
Moozone Online music storage and community service 8,000,000 730,000 590,000
MP3.com information about digital music and artists (formerly freely-licensed music download) Does not play its own music
MusicBrainz Open content music database. 10,000,000[13] 948,000[13] 608,000[13] GPL/LGPL/PD/CC-BY-NC-SA
MusicMight Biographies and discographies
Musipedia Search by melody (entering notes, Parsons code, whistling, or tapping rhythm) Yes, but via other sources
Mutopia Project repository of free content sheet music
MySpace Artist bios and artist-uploaded music streaming
Nigerian Music Factory Artist, DJ, Producer bios and artist-uploaded music streaming
Ovation Press Online publisher of classical string music
Online Music DB Music information, YouTube Videos and Lyrics 200
Pandora Music recommendation and Internet radio service. USA-only
Rainwave Online music community featuring Video Game music. Users can request and rate music. Music is selected by election: During every song, users vote from a selection of three tracks to choose the next song to play. ~11,000 ~1,500 ~1,800
Radio Croquer Social Network and music stations Yes
RadioPalmwine Nigerian Radio Station, Online music community and Entertainment Portal
Rate Your Music Catalog, rate, tag, and review your music. ~1,900,000 [14] 580,000 [14]
Rolldabeats Drum N Bass music database, physical releases only.
ShareTheMusic Service for free and legally music sharing.
SparkTop10 Free music sharing using YouTube API.
Werner Icking Music Archive
Wikifonia
WhoSampled User-generated database of comparison between original songs and covers or songs that uses samples. 48,000 18,000
WorldCat

On-demand streaming music services

The following is a list of online music stores that currently offer some free on-demand music streaming of full-length content over the Internet as a part of their service[15] without the listener necessarily purchasing a file for download.[16] One might compare this type of service to internet radio. Many of these sites have advertising and offer non-free options in the style of an online music store. For a list of online music stores that provide a means of purchasing and downloading music as files of some sort, see comparison of online music stores. Many of both types of sites offer browsing by song title, artist, etc. that amounts to a form of online music database.

Database # of tracks. Available in Pricing PC Android iOS BlackBerry Windows Phone 7 Notes
8tracks 7 million Everywhere Free/Subscription Web Yes Yes No Soon Commercial free
Deezer 13 million [17] FR/UK Free/Subscription Web Yes Yes Yes Yes Also available on Symbian.
fizy USA Free Web
Grooveshark 22 million Everywhere? Free/Subscription Web/Desktop Application Partial, Rooted Partial, Jailbroken Yes No
Last.fm 12 million[18] USA/UK/Germany (free) - Everywhere? Free/Subscription Web/Desktop Application Yes Yes Yes Yes Available on Xbox 360
Mflow 5 million UK Free Web
MOG 11 million+ [19] USA Subscription Web Yes Yes No No Available on Roku
Pandora 700,000 [20] USA Free/Subscription Yes Yes Yes Yes
Qriocity 6 million+ [21] USA/UK/IR/FR/SP/IT/GE/JP Subscription Web Yes No No No Available on PS3/PSP/Bravia TVs/BIVL
Rdio 9 million [22] USA and Canada Subscription Web/Desktop Application Yes Yes No Yes
Rhapsody 9 million [23] USA
Simfy 13 million [24] Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium [25] Free/Subscription Web/Desktop Application Yes Yes Yes No
Slacker 2.4 million [26] USA, Canada
Spotify 15 million [27] Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, USA Free/Subscription Desktop Application Yes Yes Yes Yes Requires a Facebook account. Available on Palm, Sonos, Symbian, Boxee[28], Telia Digital-tv, webOS & Windows Phone 6.x.
Thumbplay 8 million [29] Subscription
we7 6.8 million [30] UK, Ireland & Belgium Free/Subscription Web Yes Yes No No Now a personal DJ service. Music on demand is still available to premium users.
WiMP 10 million [31] Norway, Sweden and Denmark Subscription Desktop Application Yes Yes No No
Zune 10 million [32] USA Subscription Desktop Application No No No Yes Available on Xbox 360

See also

References

  1. ^ a b "Coverage Statistics". allmusic. http://www.allmusic.com/about/. Retrieved 2011-06-12. 
  2. ^ a b c "BestEverAlbums.com Statistics". BestEverAlbums.com. http://www.besteveralbums.com/howitworks.php. Retrieved 2010-07-28. 
  3. ^ "Data and API Coverage Statistics". Decibel. http://www.decibel.net/blog. Retrieved 2011-03-29. 
  4. ^ "Data Dumps". Discogs. http://www.discogs.com/data/. Retrieved 2010-06-13. 
  5. ^ a b "Advertise on Discogs". Discogs. http://www.discogs.com/help/advertise. Retrieved 2010-06-04. 
  6. ^ a b c "M-A Statistics". Encyclopaedia Metallum. http://www.metal-archives.com/stats.php. Retrieved 2010-07-14. 
  7. ^ http://www.gracenote.com/press/01/23/2011/
  8. ^ http://www.gracenote.com/press/01/23/2011/
  9. ^ http://www.gracenote.com/press/09/09/2010/
  10. ^ "Library statistics". IMSLP. http://www.imslp.org/wiki/. Retrieved 2010-12-17. .
  11. ^ "Audio main page". Internet Archive. http://www.archive.org/details/audio. Retrieved 2011-10-26. 
  12. ^ http://cbsimg.com/our-products/last-fm/
  13. ^ a b c "Database Statistics". MusicBrainz. http://musicbrainz.org/statistics. Retrieved 2011-05-26. 
  14. ^ a b "RYM Statistics". RateYourMusic. http://rateyourmusic.com/board_message?message_id=868876&find=2765614&x=m#msg2765614. Retrieved 2010-07-15. 
  15. ^ "The best online music service!". Matthews, Paul. SRF. http://stream-recorder.com/forum/showthread.php?p=9. Retrieved 2011-04-01. 
  16. ^ "Pricing of Content Services – An Empirical Investigation of Music as a Service". Doerr, Jonathan; Benlian, Alexander; Vetter, Johannes; Hess, Thomas. http://aisel.aisnet.org/amcis2010/36/. Retrieved 2011-02-26. 
  17. ^ "Deezer is Expanding Streaming Music Service in Major Global Push". http://www.thespacelab.tv/spaceLAB/2011/10October/MusicNews-079-Deezer-Stream.htm. Retrieved 2011-10-25. 
  18. ^ http://cbsimg.com/our-products/last-fm/
  19. ^ http://blog.mog.com/press-other.php
  20. ^ "How Pandora Slipped Past the Junkyard". The New York Times. 2010-03-07. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/08/technology/08pandora.html. Retrieved 2010-05-08. 
  21. ^ http://qriocity.com/gb/en/music-special-offer.html/
  22. ^ "Can Rdio Withstand The Spotify Assault? A Feature-By-Feature Look". TechCrunch. 2011-07-14. http://techcrunch.com/2011/07/14/spotify-vs-rdio/. Retrieved 2011-07-14. 
  23. ^ "Rhapsody About Us". Rhapsody International Inc.. http://www.rhapsody.com/about-us. Retrieved 2010-08-08. 
  24. ^ "simfy Expands Further and Launches in Belgium". http://corporate.simfy.com/news/single-view/simfy-expands-further-and-launches-in-belgium/d8d3ccc735bee6a004a22f260ceece4c/. Retrieved 2011-11-07. 
  25. ^ "simfy Expands Further and Launches in Belgium". http://corporate.simfy.com/news/single-view/simfy-expands-further-and-launches-in-belgium/d8d3ccc735bee6a004a22f260ceece4c/. Retrieved 2011-11-07. 
  26. ^ CES 08: Slacker Portable arrives this month
  27. ^ "Spotify vs. Girl Talk: What Is Spotify’s Music Catalog Missing?". http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2011/07/22/spotify_vs_girl_talk_what_is_spotify_s_music_catalog_missing_.html. Retrieved 2011-07-22. 
  28. ^ "Spotify and Boxee, together at last". http://www.spotify.com/us/blog/archives/2011/10/14/spmarket-2spotify-and-boxee-together-at-lastspmarket/. Retrieved 2011-10-14. 
  29. ^ "Thumbplay About Us". Thumbplay Inc.. http://www.thumbplay.com/about. Retrieved 2010-12-21. 
  30. ^ We7 moves beyond UK with Irish launch
  31. ^ "WiMP FAQ". http://wimp.dk/site/web3/view.ftl?page=faq_getwimp&language=dk_dk#musikk. Retrieved 2011-05-26. 
  32. ^ http://zune.net/en-us/press/2009/0915-zunelaunch.htm