A coalition of major and independent record companies has put forward a unified proposal to govern the eligibility of generative AI recordings on official music charts worldwide. The group includes Believe, BMG, Concord, Dirty Hit, Glassnote Records, HYBE, Mom+Pop Music, Partisan Records, Sony Music, Universal Music Group, and Warner Music Group. The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) has endorsed the proposal and will apply its principles to IFPI-run charts and its network of national group charts.
The proposal seeks to establish clear boundaries between human-led creativity, legitimate AI assistance, and purely synthetic or unauthorized AI content. It also aims to prevent fraudulently boosted streams from being recognized on commercial charts.
Under the proposed guidelines, any recording created with generative AI tools must meet three fundamental requirements to qualify for chart inclusion. One requirement explicitly disqualifies tracks produced using unapproved generative AI models, particularly those trained on copyrighted recordings without permission.
The chart initiative builds on a recently announced cross-industry AI labeling program supported by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), IFPI, the American Association of Independent Music (A2IM), the Independent Music Companies Association (IMPALA), SAG-AFTRA, and the Recording Academy. That program introduced standardized metadata tags distinguishing between “AI-Generated” and “AI-Assisted” content, which travel from distributors to digital service providers (DSPs). Under the new chart proposal, tracks tagged as “AI-Generated” are automatically disqualified.
Music attorney Chris Castle commented on the significance of the alignment. “Standing alone, that would be noteworthy,” Castle said. “But viewed alongside the recently announced industry-wide AI labeling initiative, something more significant is beginning to emerge: the foundations of an AI governance framework for recorded music. For the first time, the industry is building the practical infrastructure necessary to govern it.”
Castle added that establishing reliable AI data at the distribution stage prevents chart organizations from having to police unauthorized content after it has already gone viral. “It can improve royalty administration, reduce fraudulent submissions, support licensing compliance, strengthen credit accuracy, and help digital services distinguish between human-created recordings and recordings generated substantially through AI systems,” he said.
The unified frameworks provide distributors and digital services with a clear standard to enforce.
