How to Use Copyrighted Music on Facebook Legally

Using that perfect, trending song in your Facebook video feels like it should be simple, but the fear of copyright strikes and muted posts holds many creators back. The good news is that you absolutely can use music legally on the platform without getting in trouble. This guide will walk you through exactly how Facebook’s music rules work, the safe methods for adding songs to your content, and the common mistakes to avoid.

Understanding Facebook’s Music Rules: Let’s Get a Few Things Straight

First, it's helpful to understand why these rules exist. It’s not just Meta being difficult. Music is protected by copyright law, meaning the artists, songwriters, and record labels who create it have the right to get paid when it's used. To handle this, Meta (Facebook's parent company) has signed massive licensing agreements with major players in the music industry.

These agreements are what allow you to add popular music to your personal Facebook Stories or create a lip-sync Reel without immediately receiving a takedown notice. However, these licenses come with some important details that every creator and brand needs to understand.

The Big Difference: Personal vs. Commercial Use

The single most important distinction Facebook makes is between personal and commercial content. This changes everything about what you’re allowed to do.

• Personal Use: This refers to content that is not promoting a product or service. Sharing a video of your family vacation with a Taylor Swift song in the background is a great example. Celebrating your friend’s birthday in a Facebook Story with their favorite jam is personal use. In these cases, you’re generally covered by Facebook’s licensing agreements, especially if you use the music tools built directly into the app (like the sticker in Stories or the audio library in Reels).
• Commercial Use: This includes any video that promotes a business, brand, product, or service. If you are creating a Reel showing off a new dress your boutique sells, an ad for your coaching service, or even a lifestyle video sponsored by a brand, you're in commercial territory. The standard music license Facebook has for personal use does not typically extend to business content. Using a popular, copyrighted song in this context could be seen as an implied endorsement, which is a big legal no-no without a separate, specific license.

So, what can businesses do? Don’t worry, you have several excellent (and perfectly legal) options.

The Safe & Legal Ways to Use Music on Facebook

Forget the guesswork and risky workarounds. These are the legitimate methods for pairing sound with your videos, whether you’re a casual creator or a global brand.

Method 1: Dive into Facebook's Sound Collection

This is your safest bet, especially for branded content, ads, or long-form videos published directly to your Facebook Page. The Facebook Sound Collection is a huge library of thousands of royalty-free songs and sound effects that Meta has acquired and made available for free.

How to find and use it:

1. Navigate to Meta Business Suite or Creator Studio.
2. Look for the “All tools” section in the left-hand menu.
3. Select “Sound Collection.” You’ll find a searchable database.
4. You can filter by genre, mood, tempo, and even vocals. Once you find a track you like, you can download it and add it to your video using any video editing software.

Pros:

• 100% Free & Legal: Every track in this collection is cleared for you to use across Facebook and Instagram videos. No copyright strikes, no muted videos. Period.
• Great for Background Music: It’s perfect for finding ambient, moody, or upbeat instrumental tracks to set the tone for tutorials, vlogs, product demos, and ads.

Cons:

• No Chart-Toppers: You won’t find Drake or Olivia Rodrigo here. The collection is more akin to stock music, which may not work if your video’s entire concept is built around a specific trending song.

Method 2: Use the Music Library Inside Reels and Stories

For short-form video, jumping on audio trends is a huge part of the game. That’s where the built-in music features for Reels and Stories come in. When you create a Reel or Story directly in the Facebook or Instagram app, you get access to a library of popular and trending songs.

This is the primary way everyday users and creators legally add hit songs to their content.

The Catch for Businesses:

If you're operating a Business Account on Facebook or Instagram, you'll notice that your music library looks different. You'll still have access to a large selection of music, but it’s from a more limited source that is pre-cleared for commercial use. The idea is to protect both you and Meta from copyright issues related to commercial promotion.

So while a personal profile might be able to add the latest viral TikTok sound to their Reel, your brand’s account might not see it as an option. You still have access to millions of songs, including many original audios that are trending, but it won't be the entire Billboard Hot 100.

The Strategy: Lean into the original audios and royalty-free music available in the business library. A trending audio doesn't have to be a major-label song. It can be a funny voiceover, a relatable snippet of conversation, or an original sound from another creator that has gone viral. These are almost always available for businesses to use.

Method 3: License the Music Yourself (The Professional Route)

What if you’re a business and you absolutely need a specific vibe for your promotional video that you can’t find in the Sound Collection? Your best option is to license the music yourself.

This sounds more intimidating than it is. Great music licensing platforms make it incredibly simple. These services work with artists to offer vast catalogs of high-quality music that you can license for an affordable fee. They have libraries far superior to most free stock music sites.

Popular music licensing services include:

• Epidemic Sound: A subscription-based model with a massive, high-quality catalog. Their "Commercial Plan" covers social media usage.
• Artlist: Another subscription darling with fantastic music from indie artists. A "Social Creator" plan covers most online use cases.
• Soundstripe: Offers both subscriptions and single-track licensing, giving you more flexibility for one-off projects.
• Musicbed: Known for cinematic, high-end music from impressive artists. This is often the go-to for professional filmmakers and big ad campaigns.

The process is straightforward: You search for a track, purchase a single license or use a track from your subscription, and receive a certificate or license key. Then, if your video ever gets flagged by Facebook’s automated Content ID system, you can submit proof of your license to have the claim cleared.

What Happens If You Use Copyrighted Music Anyway?

Let's say you decide to break the rules and upload a video with a commercially released song you don't have the rights to. Thanks to an automated system called Meta's Rights Manager, your video will likely be flagged instantly. Here are the most common consequences:

• Your Audio Gets Muted: This is the most frequent penalty. Facebook will simply mute the portion of your video containing the unlicensed song. Your video stays up, but it plays in silence.
• Your Video Is Blocked: In some cases, especially if a label has a strict policy, your video may be blocked entirely, either worldwide or in specific countries where Meta doesn't have a license for that song.
• You Lose Monetization Features: For creators earning money from their videos via in-stream ads or fan subscriptions, using unlicensed music is a fast track to getting a video demonetized or losing access to monetization tools altogether.
• Your Account Gets a Strike: While less common for simple audio usage, the copyright holder has the right to issue a formal takedown notice. Accumulating multiple copyright strikes can lead to restrictions being placed on your Page or profile and, in severe cases, having your account unpublished.

Common Myths About Music on Facebook (That Will Get You in Trouble)

A lot of bad advice on this topic floats around online. Let’s clear up a few persistent myths that can land you in Facebook jail.

Myth: "If I give credit to the artist in my caption, it's okay."

Reality: False. Adding "Music by [Artist Name]" or "I do not own the rights" to your video description does absolutely nothing from a legal perspective. Proper crediting is respectful, but it is not a substitute for a license. The copyright holder still has the right to file a claim.

Myth: "If I only use 15 seconds of a song, it's 'fair use'."

Reality: False. There's no magical "15-second rule" that makes copyright infringement okay. Fair use is a complicated legal principle that usually applies to contexts like critique, news reporting, or parody. Using a song to make your product video feel cooler is a commercial purpose and almost never qualifies as fair use.

Myth: "The algorithm won't catch me if I speed up or change the pitch of the song."

Reality: False. The audio fingerprinting technology used by Facebook is incredibly powerful. It can detect copyrighted audio even if it's been slightly sped up, slowed down, or has other effects layered on top. Trying to trick the system is a losing battle and a waste of your valuable time.

Final Thoughts

Navigating music rights on Facebook comes down to choosing the right tool for the job. Use the in-app audio library for trending sounds in Reels and Stories, rely on the Facebook Sound Collection for safe background music in branded content, and turn to licensing services when you need that perfect song for a commercial campaign. Following these guidelines lets you harness the power of music without worrying about muted videos or copyright strikes.

Once you’ve paired your visuals with the perfect legally-sourced audio track, the final step is posting it. Properly managing and scheduling video assets, especially modern formats like Reels and Shorts, is vital for maintaining a consistent social presence. At Postbase, we designed our platform specifically for today’s video-first world. You can upload your content once, plan everything out on a simple visual calendar, and have full confidence that your videos will publish on time, every time, without hiccups. It’s the kind of reliability that helps you streamline your workflow and get back to creating.