Audio

Audio is an asset category in the library. Audio assets can be used within a place through objects.

User-uploaded audio
Prior to 2009, it was possible to upload sounds unmoderated and without limit.

From 2009 to 2013, sounds were only able to be uploaded to the catalog by administrators; most of which was provided by Roblox,, or. The latter two still have all their uploaded audio available on their profiles to this day.

In late 2013, players are allowed to upload and publish their MP3 and OGG files on Roblox by purchasing them with Robux, if the audio does not violate the Terms of Service and does not have any copyrighted material. This allowed for a broader plethora of audio to be used in places.

In early 2014, Roblox's sound engine was changed so that audio is now more reliable in playback. Playback is nearly guaranteed, even if the audio asset hasn't been preloaded.

On March 9, 2022, Roblox replaced price limitations with a monthly limit to how many audio files users can upload and allowed free uploading as well. Users who have been ID verified are allowed to upload 100 files per month. Users within the developer exchange program are allowed to upload 2,000 files per month. All other users are only allowed to upload 10 files per month.

Roblox also announced privacy changes that in March 22, 2022, all new audio uploaded will be Private and all existing audio with length of over 6 seconds will be set to Private. Audio assets uploaded by Roblox and Monstercat will remain Public. Private audio cannot be used/played if the user/group did not upload the audio. Roblox recommends developers to review and replace their audio. Roblox also added Audio Discovery Plugin to Roblox Studio which assists finding and replacing audio.

On March 17, 2022, Roblox announced an update to the audio privacy changes. Roblox will have a team to keep most sound effects Public, even if it's longer than 6 seconds. Roblox also partnered with Pro Sound Effects to bring lots of sound effects available to use by anyone. These sound effects are uploaded by Roblox and always end with (SFX). Roblox will also be adding "asset permissions" for audio, which allows users to grant permissions for which experiences can use them, or for all experiences.

On the same day, Roblox also announced that users can fill out a survey to help Roblox suit the limit to the frequency and quantity of uploads to the user's needs in the future. Roblox is also announcing privacy for other asset types.

On March 22, 2022, Roblox will also partner with other music companies, such as Nettwerk Music Group and Position Music.

Limitations
Audio files must be either MP3 or OGG and have a length at most 7 minutes.

History of limitations
When it was originally implemented, the system only allowed 15 seconds of audio and cost a player 250 Robux per audio asset, allegedly set up to prevent misuse of the feature. However, a loophole was discovered shortly afterwards, in which players could technically upload a full song by speeding it up to the point where the song's duration is lower than 15 seconds, and creators could tweak the pitch to be lowered at a specific value (usually predetermined by the uploader in the description), for the full song to play normally, although losing some quality.

On January 15, 2014, Roblox increased the sound limit to 120 seconds, 8 times the length of the previous limit, and the cost decreased by 60% to 100 Robux, allowing longer audio to be uploaded for a lower price. The update proved to be successful, as it reduced the hassle of uploading multiple short samples of a long audio and also reduced the complications that came with the pricing.

On March 18, 2015, Roblox allowed uploading of OGG files, which have more seamlessness looping than MP3 files.

On September 26, 2016, the sound limit was increased to 6 minutes, while the cost would be changed to a dynamic pricing system.

On October 6, 2016, the dynamic pricing system and limit of 6 minutes would be temporarily retired while some issues would be fixed. About a week later, the dynamic pricing system and limit of 6 minutes were returned.

As of December 1, 2016, the audio limit has been increased to 7 minutes.

On an unknown date in late 2018, the cost for audio was changed to 35 Robux instead of 75 for audio length ranging from 59 seconds to 2 minutes. Later in 2019, the cost for that length is now 70 Robux.

Prior to March 9, 2022, the prices for audio depended on the length. Audio that had length of under 10 seconds would cost 20 Robux, 10 to 59 seconds would cost 35 Robux, 1 to 2 minutes would cost 70 Robux, and the rest would cost 350 Robux.

National Music Publishers' Association lawsuit
On June 9, 2021, Roblox was sued by the National Music Publishers' Association for copyright infringement for allegedly allowing the unauthorized use of copyrighted songs.

After the lawsuit though not moderated; audios by the National Music Publishers' Association will no longer play in-game and will bring up error 46 in the client and attempting to search artist names on the audio tab in the Library will be blocked but not censored.

This is also likely the reason why all Accessories that allowed you to play custom audio were taken offsale in early 2021.

Sound ID
All audio, like other objects, are given a unique ID that can be found in the URL of their audio page. Unlike other objects, they do not need to be subtracted and are given directly. Audio IDs are used when creating Sound objects.

Downloading Roblox audio
Roblox doesn't provide a built-in feature to download any audio from the Library. However, third-party tools (such as the BTRoblox browser extension) allows downloading of audio (even Roblox's Licensed Music, which Roblox doesn't allow downloading).

APM Music
In late May 2018, Roblox signed a license agreement with APM Music, a music company that produces and licenses soundtracks for usage in films, TV shows, video games, and commercials. Soon afterwards, thousands of APM Music tracks were uploaded onto the Library by, allowing developers various free music of any style for their experience without risk of copyright infringement (given if they only use up to 250 per experience). More information can be found in this tutorial.

When Roblox did this massive uploads, the description was organized with this order:


 * the description of the song under "quotes";
 * the duration of the song in seconds (normally, for commercial purposes, many songs have cutted versions to 60" and 30");
 * genre: there are many genres on Roblox, such as Club/Electronica, Jazz, Pop, etc.;
 * library: shows the library of the song. The most known are from Bruton, KPM and Sonoton;
 * album: shows the album name;
 * the album info that you can search on APM website;
 * and the "Courtesy of APM Music" phrase;

However, for some reason, the composer's/s' name(s) are not mentioned in the description. To find the composer's/s' name(s), you have to search the tracks yourself on APM Music itself.

Here's a step-by-step tutorial on how to find the composer's/s' name(s):


 * 1) Go to https://www.apmmusic.com/search
 * 2) Type the song name in "Start your search..."
 * 3) Do not press enter. Instead, click on the correct title  under "Track Title" to search for the specific song name.
 * 4) Type the name of the album in the search box.
 * 5) Click on the bold text under "Album Title".
 * 6) Hover over the correct track, and press the down arrow. The composer's/s' name(s) will appear. Ignore the percentage(s) and the "PRS/SACEM etc."

Alternatively, just copy and paste this link and replace the text in bold with the song title and album name.

https://www.apmmusic.com/search/[{"field":"track_title","value":" Song title ","operation":"must"},{"field":"album_title","value":" Album name ","operation":"must"}]

Note: spaces are fine because of URL encoding.

One example is the track "Ghost", created in 2004 and was also used in Plankton's Robotic Revenge years prior back in 2013 and it used APM Music

Copyright claims on YouTube
Many people complained that they've been getting copyright claims (Content ID claims) from the licensed music in their videos, due to the fact that these music are copyrighted (These are not copyright strikes, meaning their videos are not taken down, but cannot be monetized).

Roblox allows users to post videos containing these music in their videos. The music, however, can only be used in Roblox gameplay videos.

'''Note: In the website, Roblox says "copyright takedown", but copyright takedowns will most likely never happen. Copyright claims are more common, but not strikes.'''

Copyright claims containing this music can easily be disputed (only if it is a Roblox gameplay video) using this following process:


 * 1) Go to the claims on YouTube
 * 2) Make sure the song is a song from APM Music (licensed by Roblox). If it isn't, you cannot dispute the claim.
 * 3) If you're 100% sure this song is from APM Music, go to "Select Actions".
 * 4) Select "Dispute".
 * 5) Check the box that says "My dispute isn't based on any of the reasons above. I would still like to dispute this Content ID claim.", and click on Continue.
 * 6) Select "License".
 * 7) Check the box that says "I have permission to use the content from the copyright owner."
 * 8) Mention that the song can be used in videos because it is used in a Roblox gameplay. The word "Roblox" has to be mentioned somewhere in the information.
 * 9) Check all of the boxes.
 * 10) Enter your full name (not a channel name).
 * 11) Click on "Submit".

For more information, visit this website.

Copyrighted audio removal
Note: there are two types of copyright audio:


 * 1) Roblox's licensed audio. They're copyrighted but licensed by Roblox to be allowed for use. All of these songs are from APM Music.
 * 2) Other copyright audio. They're also copyrighted but not allowed for use. They're in process of being removed. They are non-APM copyrighted songs.

On May 30, 2018, Roblox announced on the DevForum that they will begin an automated process to remove all copyrighted audio (that is not part of Roblox's licensed audio) from the site on June 18. This means that developers can only use audio produced by themselves, Roblox's licensed audio or non-copyrighted audio. Most popular audio on Roblox is copyrighted, so moderation action will not be taken on anyone who has uploaded audio that falls into this category before the changes take effect. Flagged audio cannot be played on the website, are marked with the pictured notice, and have their name and description be replaced with "(Removed for copyright)". Experiences that use this audio will previously have it replaced with one of these 10 tracks:

However, as of right now, the audio will just not play at all rather than getting replaced with one of the 10 tracks above.

Roblox has stated that the main reason for this is to give the Corporation itself better first impressions to future companies that they want to work with. Similar to the Pokémon Brick Bronze takedown, if an artist or record label found out that their music was being used by a site or user without permission (especially for monetary gain) then it would most likely lead to a lawsuit if action was not taken by the host.

On July 4, 2018, after the audio removal was completed, a bug arose in which users who uploaded copyrighted audio would be terminated, due to a glitch in a bot which gave the user double Robux when refunded. This was later fixed, although the community is still skeptical about uploading audio. This incident lead to complain about Roblox's moderation in this devforum post, which is trending with over 200 likes, as of July 9.

However, copyrighted audio can still be uploaded to Roblox if it is modified enough to be distinguished from the original, usually by changing the pitch or adding a voice clip in the beginning.

Reaction
This decision has been criticized for being quite sudden, and concerns over playable audio using custom Boombox passes in games have also been raised. Some have argued that there will be no concrete way to prevent users from uploading copyrighted material even after the change, and that games which rely on copyrighted music (e.g. Robeats!) will be heavily crippled by the mass removal of soundtracks.

Adult content incident
On June 22, 2018, the Roblox profile uploaded adult content in the form of audio. Due to the partnership with APM Music, this could have been a human error on both companies' part, with Roblox automatically uploading anything released by APM, and APM not categorizing SFW from NSFW. Since the audio gained attention, Roblox have transferred its ownership to a random inactive account and later deleting the audio, but people caught on and criticized them for it. Along with the audio in question, the Roblox profile uploaded a safe version.

On March 9, 2022, Roblox uploaded multiple songs that contain swear words. This is due to a bot that re-uploads songs from APM Music to Roblox, and not applying the filter to Roblox-uploaded songs. Shortly after, the song titles have been changed to "[ Content Removed ]", and the descriptions has been blanked too.

Monstercat
On July 25, 2020, in addition to APM Music, Roblox also partnered with Monstercat so that their music can also be used freely in Roblox.

Bypassed audio
Bypassed audio are inappropriate user-generated content, which however are approved by audio moderation team, either due to human error or not being thoroughly moderated.

Sometime in 2014, an unknown user found a bug where you could upload audios via making a plugin, which started to make a lot of bypassed audios. This eventually was fixed but not for long, as of mid 2016 people have been making audios but this time instead of plugins, they used RenderMeshes to bypass the moderation system, this ultimately created a lot of bypassing loop-holes for at least 10 months until on April 26, 2017, all audios that were RenderMeshes simply did not work in the instance and what was followed by tougher moderation regarding the assets.

Shortly after April's incident, people have started to find out more ways to bypass audios so that inappropriate content can be allowed on Roblox, although people have been slowing/speeding up audios so that they can change the pitch in the experience so it creates an inappropriate sound, people needed a more reliable source, so in May 2017, people started uploading normal audios with a selection of audio which was silent (silence ranges from 20 seconds to a couple of minutes) then inappropriate material/sound/music would play to trick the Moderators into approving the audio, people have still been uploading raw audios of inappropriate content and again it has worked. It is unknown whether or not this has been patched, however more rigorous checks have been introduced to combat the issue of bypassed audios.

Criticism
Some players view those who use 'ear-blaster' or inappropriate audio as "immature" and "annoying." Players usually do this as a form of trolling or just to be able to play explicit music that is otherwise not allowed on Roblox. It is often done in experiences where players are able to play audio publicly (i.e. with a boombox-type gear.)

Trivia

 * There is a bug where some audio files stop playing after a couple seconds. This bug only occurs on the website.
 * There is another bug where an audio file won't play at all (Mostly on .ogg sound files).
 * Some users have gotten banned by the moderation system for uploading audio that was considered too loud. Making loud audios can apparently result in moderation (depending on how loud).
 * The longest song on Roblox before September 25, 2013, was Mubarek - Resist (rmx).
 * As of right now, there are some audio on Roblox that can still be played on the website but not in experiences. Example
 * Sounds were able to be played in reverse by setting the Pitch property to a negative value, but this behavior was changed at some point. The property now only accepts positive values and zero, and attempting to set it (or the PlaybackSpeed property) to a negative value will set it to zero instead. This was done because some users were using it as a way to bypass moderation.