The US statutory mechanical royalty rate for 2026 is 13.1 cents per composition per copy, or 2.52 cents per minute of playing time, whichever is larger. Whether that number carries forward into 2028 or resets to 12 cents is being decided right now at the Copyright Royalty Board, and written direct statements in the unsettled parts of the case are due 5 October 2026.
CRB means Copyright Royalty Board, the panel at the Library of Congress that sets US statutory rates. Its Phonorecords V proceeding covers 2028 through 2032, and it sets the floor for anyone pressing vinyl or selling downloads into the United States.
The rate you are already paying
Section 115 of the US Copyright Act creates a compulsory licence. Once a song is released, anyone may make and distribute copies without permission, provided they pay the statutory rate. Every physical unit and permanent download triggers it, per composition, per copy.
The Phonorecords IV determination set the base at 12 cents in 2023 and indexed it annually. COLA means cost of living adjustment. The formula in 37 CFR 385.11 multiplies the 12-cent base by the movement in the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers against a fixed reference of 298.012, the November 2022 reading.
The index published before December 2025 came in at 324.800, which is how the judges arrived at 13.1 cents and 2.52 cents for 2026. That is roughly 9 percent on the base across three annual adjustments.
What the settlement actually proposes
The CRB opened Phonorecords V on the last day of 2025 and closed petitions on 30 January 2026. On 29 June 2026, Sony, Universal and Warner, plus A2IM (the American Association of Independent Music), the NMPA, the Nashville Songwriters Association International and the Music Artists Coalition filed a partial settlement.
It covers Subpart B only: physical phonorecords, permanent downloads, ringtones and bundles. As Mandy Dalugdug reported for Music Business Worldwide on 13 July 2026, the parties asked that existing rates not be amended except for continuing inflation adjustments.
Where the 12-cent argument comes from
The comment window closed 10 August 2026 and the filings split. Songwriters of North America, the Recording Academy and the AIMP backed the deal as stability. Word Collections and the Songwriters Guild of America did not.
In a joint objection covered by Dylan Smith at Digital Music News on 11 August 2026, the two argued the proposal reverts to the 12-cent Phono IV base on 1 January 2028 rather than picking up at 13.1 cents. They further argued the 12-cent base was calculated on inflation data running only to the end of 2020, and that including the 2021 and 2022 spike would have produced 13.6 cents, or roughly 15.6 cents on cumulative adjustments since 2020. Eight Mile Style, Eminem’s publisher, called the proposal a rate freeze.
What the gap costs a real catalogue
On a ten-track album, the difference between 13.1 cents and 12 cents is 11 cents per unit. Press 1,000 vinyl copies and that is 110 dollars. Across a forty-title catalogue over a five-year term, it stops being rounding.
Two things matter more than the headline number:
- The rate is charged per composition, not per release. A twenty-track deluxe edition costs twice what a ten-track album does.
- Controlled composition clauses in traditional recording agreements commonly cut the mechanical by 25 percent and fix the rate at the date of release, which means a signed artist may never see a COLA at all. Eight Mile Style raised exactly this point in its filing.
The streaming half is still open
Subpart C, which governs interactive streaming, is not settled. Participants include Spotify USA, Apple, Amazon, Google and Pandora on one side and the publisher and label blocs on the other. Phonorecords IV took the headline all-in rate to 15.35 percent of a service’s US revenue by 2027. That is the number now in play for 2028.
The move for independents is unglamorous: register and match every composition before 2028, because a rate you cannot claim is worth nothing. We have covered how the MLC divides its unmatched pool by market share and how long a non-US territory waits for a working pipeline into that system. The rate is set in Washington. The collection is your problem.
