No fuss platform for hosting decent quality audio for sharing / being stumbled upon>

[lingyai]

I'd like some advice re distribution please. I have no aspirations to monetise my stuff - a mix of original instrumentals and covers - but I'd like to get it heard. I am getting feedback from people I've shared Soundcloud links with that it insists they download an app, which makes it functionally a wall between me and many listeners who (like me) are spoiled for choice of free music to explore and can't be bothered with that. I have noticed that traffic to my SC page all but stopped since they implemented this :/

So I'm looking for something as one-click failsafe to share with anyone as, say, a Youtube link; which I'd use, except Youtube audio is really degraded, defeating the purpose of working hard on a mix and master, especially harmony-rich stuff like mine. Is there anything like this which doesn't cost a fortune? I'd love it if my audience could easily hear something approaching the quality of a 44.1 khz 16 bit wav file. (I know there is Youtube Music, which has much nicer audio quality, bit it seems that can only be played by subscribers).

Grateful for any advice.

[seangm]

Whyp has good audio quality from what I was told and is free. I'm not an expert or anything but the audio quality sounds better to my ears than Soundcloud. I think they get into the technical details of the streaming on the site so maybe worth checking out.

https://whyp.it/

[lingyai]

I'd not heard of them. Looks quite interesting, thanks!

[SirkusPi]

I've been very happy for over a year using Wavekit (wavekit.app), which is not free but is relatively inexpensive--only €20.00 for ten hours of hosting or €100 for 100 hours. You can share wav or mp3 links (you can only upload wavs or other lossess formats; it does the mp3 coversions "in house"), and there is no advertising or other garbage whatsoever, which is exactly what I was looking for. (There are also no social functions, commenting, etc.; it's purely for hosting and sharing. So if you are looking for social functionality, this wouldn't fit the bill.)

I have no affiliation with Wavekit whatsoever, other than being a happy customer.

[planetearth]

I'd like some advice re distribution please. I have no aspirations to monetise my stuff - a mix of original instrumentals and covers - but I'd like to get it heard. I am getting feedback from people I've shared Soundcloud links with that it insists they download an app, which makes it functionally a wall between me and many listeners who (like me) are spoiled for choice of free music to explore and can't be bothered with that. I have noticed that traffic to my SC page all but stopped since they implemented this :/

So I'm looking for something as one-click failsafe to share with anyone as, say, a Youtube link; which I'd use, except Youtube audio is really degraded, defeating the purpose of working hard on a mix and master, especially harmony-rich stuff like mine. Is there anything like this which doesn't cost a fortune? I'd love it if my audience could easily hear something approaching the quality of a 44.1 khz 16 bit wav file. (I know there is Youtube Music, which has much nicer audio quality, bit it seems that can only be played by subscribers).

Grateful for any advice.

You don't have to download an app to listen to SoundCloud content. You can if you want to customize your listening experience or follow specific people, but it's not required.

There are more than a few free services that offer what you're looking for, but you might want to be careful what you choose. Streaming music platforms are like parties: They need enough participants to make the party feel "lively" and active. Smaller platforms simply don't have the critical mass of active users to get your music heard outside of the URL you hand out to people.

Any "free" service is going to have to make money somehow, or it simply won't last. If you put all your songs onto a platform that no one has ever heard of, your potential listeners might be overly cautious about visiting the site. Many people outside of music content creators have heard of SoundCloud (and, maybe to a lesser degree, Bandcamp, which also has a free service).

I have my stuff on SoundCloud, Bandcamp, and Hearthis.at (ever heard of that one? Yeah, I didn't think so.). The sheer number of SoundCloud users ensures 1) SoundCloud will be around for a while (thanks to their paying customers); 2) your music is more likely to be recommended to a much larger potential base of listeners; and 3) potential listeners won't be put off by visiting a site they've never heard of.

Another benefit of going with a more established service is that you won't have to spell it for them, unlike services like Hearthis.at or Whyp or some of the others. (And not to pick on Whyp, but it allows you to host only 8 minutes of your music on the free plan. I don't remember what Bandcamp and SoundCloud allow, but I know it's much more than 8 minutes.)

I'm not affiliated with SoundCloud, Bandcamp, or any other streaming service, and I have absolutely nothing against Whyp (which I didn't know existed until 10 minutes ago, and I've been helping people with these things for almost 14 years). I just know that many services have come and gone in the last decade, and unless the service gets to that critical mass of users, it won't be around for long.

Steve

[seangm]

Yeah I get what you're saying about a free hosting site needing to make money. I've been using Whyp since 2022 and never had an issue with the site being down or anything like that. From what I read it is an open source site and run by one guy. I'm not sure how he pays for storage but it looks like there is a pro version he makes money with. So there must be some limitation with the free version. For what I use it for it's been fine with the free version though.

[eLawnMust]

https://alonetone.com

[Tj Shredder]

https://bandcamp.com/

[vitocorleone123]

I would use wavekit

If your content is on SoundCloud it’s now part of their AI and/or sold to others for AI.