Free MP3 download sites: 9 legal places to download music in 2026
Short answer
The best legal free MP3 download sites are Free Music Archive, Jamendo, Bandcamp, SoundCloud and the Internet Archive, where artists chose to share their music. For music to use in videos, try the YouTube Audio Library, Pixabay Music or Incompetech. Sites offering current chart hits as free MP3s aren't licensed.
On this page
The best free MP3 download sites that are also legal are Free Music Archive, Jamendo, Bandcamp, SoundCloud and the Internet Archive, where artists or rights holders chose to give their music away. For music to put in your own videos, use the YouTube Audio Library, Pixabay Music or Incompetech. What you won’t find legally for free is this week’s chart hits: if a site offers those as free MP3s, the artists didn’t give them away.
How we put this together: on 24 October 2026 Rahul opened each site from a US connection, looked for a download button, and checked whether it asks you to sign in first. We also read each site’s licence and help pages, listed under Sources. We didn’t download any files, so we can’t vouch for audio quality. Bandcamp, Pixabay and Musopen showed our automated browser a security check, so for those three we’ve relied on their own pages.
The 9 legal free MP3 download sites at a glance
| Site | Best for | Account to download? | What you can do with it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free Music Archive | Independent music in every genre | Yes, free | Depends on each track’s licence, shown before you download |
| Jamendo Music | Independent artists, easy browsing | Not confirmed | Personal listening; commercial use needs a paid licence |
| Bandcamp | Albums artists price at $0 or “name your price” | Some artists ask for an email | Personal listening |
| SoundCloud | Tracks whose creators allow downloads | Yes | Whatever the creator allows |
| Internet Archive | Live concerts, netlabels, very old recordings | No | Usually non-commercial use, set per collection |
| YouTube Audio Library | Background music for videos | Yes, YouTube | Use in videos; some tracks need a credit |
| Pixabay Music | Royalty-free tracks with no credit needed | Not confirmed | Use and edit freely; reselling the tracks on their own isn’t allowed |
| Incompetech | Kevin MacLeod’s large library | No | Free if you credit him |
| Musopen | Classical recordings | Not confirmed | Public domain recordings |
Sites for free music to listen to
These five are for building a music library you play yourself. Each one only offers music its artists or rights holders chose to share.
Free Music Archive
Free Music Archive, run by Tribe of Noise, says most of its catalog uses “one of the popular Creative Commons licenses”. You can listen without an account, but downloading needs a free one: when we followed a download link while signed out, it sent us to the log-in page.
The best part is how clearly it shows the licence. Click a track’s download arrow and a box tells you the licence (CC BY on the track we checked), whether commercial use is allowed, and the exact credit to give. You confirm with an “I understand and agree” button before the file comes down.
Jamendo Music
Jamendo hosts independent artists who make their music free for personal listening. Every track page we opened had a Download button. If you want to use a Jamendo track in a video, a shop or anything commercial, you need a paid licence from Jamendo Licensing.
Bandcamp
On Bandcamp, artists set their own prices, and some choose $0 or “name your price”, where you can type 0. Some ask for your email address in return. The bonus is format choice: downloads come as MP3 V0, MP3 320, FLAC, AAC, Ogg Vorbis, ALAC, WAV or AIFF.
Name your price means the artist is fine with zero. If you end up playing the album a lot, paying a little next time is how they get something back.
SoundCloud
SoundCloud downloads only exist when the uploader switches them on, so most tracks have no download button at all. When a track does, you’ll find it under the waveform on the website, and you must be signed in, because SoundCloud doesn’t allow anonymous downloads. You can’t download from the mobile app, and you get the creator’s original file rather than the streaming copy.
Internet Archive
The Internet Archive needs no account and has two music collections worth knowing. The Live Music Archive holds 305,645 concert recordings from bands that gave the archive permission, and each band sets its own rules. Grateful Dead soundboard recordings, for example, stream but don’t download, at the band’s request. The Netlabels collection holds 80,542 releases from small online labels, often under Creative Commons, in MP3 and Ogg.
Sites for free music to use in your videos
If you need music for a YouTube video, a podcast or a presentation, you need a licence that covers that use, and these three spell theirs out.
YouTube Audio Library
The Audio Library lives in YouTube Studio, so you need a YouTube account. Play a track to sample it, then hover over its date and click Download to save an MP3. Creative Commons tracks need a credit in your video description, and YouTube gives you the text to copy from the licence icon.
Pixabay Music
Pixabay’s licence lets you use its music free, without crediting the artist, and change it to fit your project. The one big catch: you can’t sell or distribute the tracks on their own, as-is.
Incompetech
Incompetech is composer Kevin MacLeod’s site. The music page had 51 download buttons and no sign-in prompt when we checked. The free Creative Commons licence “requires that you credit the music”, and the site generates the credit text for you. A paid licence removes the credit for places where it won’t fit, like radio ads.
Where to find public domain music
In the US, sound recordings from 1925 and earlier are now in the public domain, so anyone can download and reuse them. The 1925 recordings joined on 1 January 2026, under the 100-year term set by the 2018 Music Modernization Act. They include Bessie Smith and Louis Armstrong’s “The St. Louis Blues” and Marian Anderson’s “Nobody Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen”.
The Internet Archive’s 78 RPM collection has 330,858 old records, with MP3 files on the items we looked at. Check the year before you reuse anything, because the collection also holds later recordings that are still under copyright. For classical music, Musopen records performances itself and releases them into the public domain, which matters because an old composition can still be a new, copyrighted recording.
Is it legal to download MP3s from YouTube converters?
Not under YouTube’s rules. Its terms say you may not “access, reproduce, download” any content “except: (a) as expressly authorized by the Service” or with written permission from YouTube and the rights holders. A converter site isn’t YouTube authorising anything.
The same goes for sites that offer current hits as free MP3s, including the ones near the top of Google for “free MP3 download”. We don’t list or link to them. If you want chart music offline, a streaming subscription’s download feature is the legal route.
What changed since our old list
The old version of this guide listed sites that linked to unlicensed copies of commercial songs, and we’ve removed them all. NoiseTrade, once a well-known free download site, now redirects to Moshpit, a live music streaming site. Every site in this guide was checked on 24 October 2026.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best free MP3 download site?
Free Music Archive is our pick for listening, because it shows each track’s licence before you download. Bandcamp suits a band you already like. For video music, use the YouTube Audio Library if you’re on YouTube, or Pixabay if you’d rather not give credit.
Can I download music from SoundCloud for free?
Only tracks whose creators have switched downloads on. Sign in on the SoundCloud website and look for the download button under the waveform. The mobile app can’t download files.
Do I need an account on Free Music Archive?
To listen, no. To download, yes: the download link sends you to the log-in page if you’re signed out. The account is free.
Can I use free downloaded music in my YouTube videos?
Only if its licence allows it. The YouTube Audio Library, Pixabay and Incompetech are built for this. On Free Music Archive, read the licence box before you download, and give the credit it asks for. Jamendo needs a paid licence for videos.
Is public domain music free to download?
Yes. In the US, recordings from 1925 and earlier are public domain, and the Internet Archive and Musopen are good places to find them. Just check the recording’s year, not only the composer’s.
What to do now
Make a free Free Music Archive account, pick a genre, and open the download box on a track you like to see its licence. If you need music for a video, start in the YouTube Audio Library instead, since it’s already inside YouTube Studio.
Sources
- Our page checks of each site on 24 October 2026 from a US connection, with screenshots, kept with this guide
- Free Music Archive FAQ
- Jamendo: licences explained
- Bandcamp help: download formats and collecting emails
- SoundCloud help: downloading tracks
- Internet Archive: Live Music Archive, its help page, Netlabels and 78 RPMs and Cylinder Recordings
- YouTube Help: Audio Library and YouTube Terms of Service
- Pixabay Content License summary
- Incompetech licences
- Musopen on Wikipedia
- Duke Center for the Study of the Public Domain: Public Domain Day 2026
Changelog
24 Oct 2026: rewritten as a list of legal sources only. It replaces an older list that included sites linking to unlicensed music.