Autohype vs CD Baby — distribution vs promotion. Do you need both?
CD Baby gets your music on Spotify and Apple Music. Autohype gets people to listen to it. They're not really competitors — but if you're choosing where to spend $97/month, here's the honest comparison.
What is CD Baby?
CD Baby is one of the oldest independent music distributors. They distribute your music to 150+ streaming platforms, collect royalties, and offer add-on services like CD Baby Pro Publishing (for publishing royalty collection) and CD Baby Music Supervision (for sync pitching). Cost: $9.95 per single, $29 per album (one-time), plus 9% revenue share on royalties.
Side-by-side comparison
| 🎵 Autohype | CD Baby | |
|---|---|---|
| Primary function | Daily TikTok promotion to grow your listener base | Music distribution to streaming platforms |
| Cost | $97/month flat — unlimited daily posting | $9.95/single or $29/album + 9% royalty cut |
| What it does for discovery | Drives 30 TikTok posts/month pushing listeners to your Spotify | Makes your music available on platforms — no active promotion |
| Spotify growth | Grows monthly listeners via TikTok → Spotify pipeline | No active listener growth — passive availability only |
| Royalty collection | Not applicable — Autohype is a promotion tool | Collects streaming + performance royalties via CD Baby Pro |
| Publishing admin | Not included | CD Baby Pro: $39/year for publishing royalty registration |
| Revenue share | None — flat monthly fee | 9% of all royalties collected |
| Best use | Post-distribution: driving the audience to find your music | Pre-promotion: getting your music onto platforms where listeners can find it |
Which is right for you?
Artists who are already distributed and need daily promotional volume to grow from 0 to 10K+ monthly listeners.
Start free trial →Artists who need to distribute their first track and want a legacy platform with royalty collection built in.
Try Autohype free for 7 days
No charge today. Cancel anytime. First video posted within 24 hours.
Start your free trial →Frequently asked questions
Should I use CD Baby or DistroKid?
For most independent artists in 2026, DistroKid ($23/year for unlimited releases, no royalty cut) is better value than CD Baby ($9.95/single + 9% royalty share). CD Baby Pro has strong publishing admin if you need that. For pure distribution + royalty collection, DistroKid + Songtrust is the better stack.
Can I use Autohype with CD Baby distributed music?
Yes — Autohype promotes any music available on Spotify and TikTok Sound, regardless of distributor. CD Baby, DistroKid, TuneCore, LANDR — doesn't matter. The distribution platform and the promotion platform are completely separate.
Does CD Baby have any TikTok promotion features?
CD Baby distributes your music to TikTok's sound library (so other creators can use it). They don't offer daily automated posting or a dedicated TikTok channel for your music. Autohype does the active daily promotion that CD Baby's distribution enables but doesn't provide.
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