Sync licence: the two clearances every placement needs

A sync licence is permission to synchronise a piece of music with visual media such as a film, television programme, advertisement or game.

The mechanism

Sync requires clearance on BOTH copyrights: the composition, cleared with the publisher and writers, and the recording, cleared with whoever owns the master. There is no statutory rate, so every fee is negotiated on the project's budget, the placement's prominence, the term, and the territory. If either side refuses, there is no placement.

A worked example

A supervisor wants an independent record for a streaming series. The master is owned by the artist, but the beat was bought on an exclusive licence under which the producer retained the publishing, so the producer must also sign before the placement can clear.

Two copyrights, two signatures. Either one can kill the placement.

What it is confused with

Mechanical royalty A mechanical is a statutory rate paid for reproducing a composition. Sync has no statutory rate at all and is freely negotiated, which is why comparable placements can differ by a factor of fifty.
Master use licence The master use licence is the recording half of a sync clearance. People often say 'sync' to mean the whole clearance, but it is two agreements and either can block the deal.

Why it matters

It is one of the few income lines in music where a single decision pays more than years of streaming, and it dies most often not on price but on an unclearable split nobody checked before the deadline.

Sources: US Copyright Office
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Related: Recoupment · Black box royalties · 360 deal