PRS for Music moves to monthly streaming royalty payments
As per their announcement in January, PRS has switched from quarterly to monthly streaming payouts.
Earlier this year, PRS for Music announced a major shift in the way it pays royalties for online streaming. As of 15 August 2025, those changes are now in effect. Members will start receiving their multi-territory online licensing (MTOL) royalties every month, rather than quarterly, for music streamed on platforms such as Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube and others.
This update to monthly royalty payments for streaming comes as digital music continues to dominate listening habits. In fact, Music Ally points out that in 2024, online usage accounted for 28.4% of all royalties paid out by PRS. The new schedule ensures that payments are more in tune with how audiences are consuming music today – and it means quicker access to earnings for creators.
The change follows a string of improvements from PRS. In 2024, the society introduced a 20% reduction in admin fees on MTOL royalties, a move projected to return an extra £47 million to members by 2030.
PRS for Music CEO Andrea Czapary Martin described the move as part of a broader goal to modernise payment systems: “This is about giving creators faster access to the money they’ve earned and the insights they need to understand how their music is performing.”
This update also builds on a successful 2024 for PRS, which saw royalty payouts grow by 8.1%, surpassing £1 billion distributed in a single year for the first time. That growth was largely driven by the surge in online streaming, meaning performance payouts for UK artists surpassed expectations.
According to the most recent update from PRS, the new monthly system is powered by back-end improvements, including a first-of-its-kind copyright database and a modernised data processing system. These upgrades allow PRS to process and distribute royalties with greater speed and accuracy across territories.
Tim Arber, PRS’s Director of Operational Improvement, explained: “We can leverage improvements in our technology, our processes and our data to get money to members sooner… that change is part of the major programme we’re running, our end-to-end distribution programme, which is fundamentally about ensuring we continue to deliver a world-leading royalty distribution service, in a rapidly evolving music landscape.”
If you’re a songwriter, performer, or recording artist of any kind, it’s wise to get familiar with how royalty colleciton works, and know what your options are. Take a look at RouteNote Publishing for more information.