The Great "Cheapest Legal Music Downloads" Hunt.

MSE_Martin

Update 2010: New Tool to replace this.

MSE's new website - www.tunechecker.com

Use it to Compare cheap MP3 download prices for singles and albums








17 June 2009: Update from MoneySavingExpert.com.

The hunt below was first carried out in August 2005; four years on and music downloads are ever more popular, AND more competitive, with an increasing number of online outlets touting for your custom. So we want to tap MoneySavers' brains about any new cheap download sites

Back to the original hunt...

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This week Tesco entered the market charging 79p for singles downloads. Yet there are many other ways to do it. So I'm tapping MoneySavers collective knowledge to find the cheapest and best legal ways.

What about file sharing?

Now let me emphasise we're talking legal ways. While file sharing is legal if the files aren't copyrighted, it is often an illegal system and I'd prefer we didn't go into it here. (Let's be honest music firms are highly litigious about these things, and I'd hate the whole site to suffer on the back of this).

So on to the hunt. Please click reply to enter your finds. The link for Tesco is below.

Tesco Music Downloads*

*Affiliated Link to external services. Click via this link and a contribution is made to MoneySavingExpert.com, which helps it stay ad-free, sponsorship-free and free to use. This in no way impacts any editorial decisions (what I write), costs you anything or changes the product. For an identical link which doesn’t help the site go to www.tesco.com. For more on how it works and the site’s non-profit driven ethical and financial policy read this.

Rex_Mundi

All of these links are completely free and completely legal.

http://www.vitaminic.co.uk/main Thousands of free tracks from more than 20,000 artists and 600 labels available.

http://www.download.com I've been using this site for years now, and only just discovered they offer 1000s of free tracks to download. Click the music button on the left.

http://www.peoplesound.com/ Tens of thousands of free downloads available on this site.

http://efolkmusic.org/ As the site name suggests. Loads of folk music on this site for free.

If you are interested in a particular artist/band. It is also worth having a look at their fan site. Sometimes the band/artist will offer one or two tracks for free download.

Sam4free

For people interested in Bollywood / Hindi Music, there is now a site that offers legal downloads with a reasonable selection at really low fees of US$ 0.69 per track.

I have been using the site for a while without any problems.

visit : https://www.crimsonbay.com

Hope that helps

ghbradshaw

Woolworths downloads are 59p each, and they have a good selection too!

https://www.woolworths.co.uk

cosmile

i am quite new to it and i did not realise....sorry

wirm

Well the title 'Legal' is a bit of a give-away!

cosmile

people do make mistakes,nobodys perfect,i dont think i will bother posting anymore,only trying to help ppl,and i honestly did not know.

pin

Russian sites are legal in Russia, doesn't mean they are legal in the UK. Actually no-one knows at present (not even the legal community) whether they are legal or not in the UK. It would be better to err on the side of caution on this one in my opinion (that is for the site).

Personally I use one of the Russian sites.

pultok

OK... Maybe no need to go through the whole Russian debate again. Here's the link to the last thread on it where it was fully debated - http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=35483 . Also, this thread ran for ages without being locked or worrying the legal people here...

richto

pin wrote:

Russian sites are legal in Russia, doesn't mean they are legal in the UK. Actually no-one knows at present (not even the legal community) whether they are legal or not in the UK. It would be better to err on the side of caution on this one in my opinion (that is for the site).

Personally I use one of the Russian sites.

Actually yes it does mean they are legal in the UK, in that music you download is considered legally licensed for personal use, and you cant legally be prevented from purchasing in this way. This is because of the Berne convention as administered by the WIPO, and WTO requirements.

I quote "...any country that is a signatory of the convention is awarded the same rights in all other countries that are signatories to the Convention as they allow their own nationals, as well as any rights granted by the Convention"

The pigopolist record companies dont like it because it cuts them out of the loop - the money paid for licences goes directly to artists! Therefore they do a 'Bush' and lie through their teeth even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary in the hope that you believe them and use their preferred overpriced and DRM crippled services.

Former_MSE_Controller2

While there is still debate over the legalities of the Russian MP3 sites, it is in the best interest of the site and posters if we refrain from recommending them at present.

Regards