YouTube is beta testing Creator Music, a large catalog of songs creators can browse and purchase for use with their original longform content. YouTube announced the service at its Made on YouTube live event the same week its chief business officer Robert Kyncl was revealed as the incoming CEO of Warner Music Group, effective January 2023. “Creator Music is a new destination in YouTube Studio that gives YouTube creators easy access to an ever-growing catalog of music for use in their long-form videos,” YouTube said, explaining the service offers “affordable, high-quality music licenses.” YouTube also announced that Shorts creators can soon share ad revenue through the platform’s Partner Program.

For creators that don’t want to pay upfront a revenue-sharing option is also offered. “Music is essential to Shorts and across YouTube — over the years, we’ve seen how creators can give classics new life, or bring a local hit to the global stage,” but the complexities of music licensing has been an impediment, YouTube VP of creator products Amjad Hanif wrote in a blog post.

“Creators have told us, time and time again, that finding the right song isn’t the hard part. It’s actually figuring out how to license it,” Hanif said at the event, according to TechCrunch, which explained “when a creator typically uses a song they don’t own, they have to give up all the ad revenues to the music license holder. That means commercial music will often not be used in YouTube videos — something the company’s new offering aims to change.”

Users can search Creator Music by song or by budget. “The service gives them a way to gain access to a larger catalog of popular music, instead of being limited only to stock music or no music at all, as is often the case, particularly with smaller creators who can’t afford the costs of using music in their videos,” TechCrunch notes.

YouTube currently has deals with about “50 labels, publishers, and distributors” participating in the program, writes Billboard.

YouTube VP of music licensing Christophe Muller told Billboard that Creator Music will be “good for the music industry, because we have 2 million creators [in the YouTube Partner Program], and that’s going to open up a new audience to artists and to songwriters.”

YouTube also announced that starting in early 2023, Shorts-focused creators can apply to its Partner Program, enjoying all benefits, “by meeting a threshold of 1,000 subscribers and 10M Shorts views over 90 days.” In Shorts, ads run between videos in the Shorts Feed. Creators will keep 45 percent of the revenue, distributed based on their share of total Shorts views.

YouTube now has 10 ways for its Partner Program members to monetize. The video streamer is also providing a way less established creators can participate, as detailed in the blog post. YouTube’s emphasis on helping Shorts creators up their production value and revenue opportunities is seen as an effort to maintain its market position as it faces new rivals such as TikTok.