FUGA Alternative: Infrastructure You Can Price First

Short answer: FUGA is the closest company in this set to what LabelGrid builds, and theirs is the wider business. Alongside digital distribution their own pages carry physical distribution, marketing services and neighbouring rights collection, with Downtown Music’s four divisions behind them. LabelGrid sells three distribution products on one backend. So the difference a buyer feels first is how an account is shaped once you are inside. Every FUGA value in the table below comes from one of their own published pages.

FUGA’s Catalog & Distribution API is real and carefully documented, with OAuth client credentials, self-service creation, immediate revocation and four categories of signed webhook, and the route to it is a conversation: the credentials tab appears only when “API access is enabled on your account”, their webhooks guide directs a client to “your business development representative, or through [email protected]”, and webhooks are activated “when your agreement with FUGA includes the use of webhooks”. Their 27 distinct captured pages, read on 23 September 2026, carry no price, no currency amount and no percentage of any kind, and their own sentence is to “contact your FUGA representative”, where every LabelGrid distribution plan and API tier price is on the pricing page and the credential gate is the plan itself. On the product closest to theirs we quote too: Imprint is scoped at onboarding, custom-deal numbers are not published, and the sandbox opens once an API plan is active rather than before you buy.

Products on one backend

DDEX ERN versions

Yours on your own DSP deals, on Custom Distribution and the API tiers

Founded

Every FUGA value below is taken from one of their own published pages, linked beneath the table with the date we read them. Where their published material does not state something, the row is left out rather than guessed at.

Each of the 9 FUGA values above is sourced from their own published pages, read 2026-09-23: fuga.com/downtown-music-content-policy/, support.fuga.com/hc/en-us/articles/23178129739284-Start-Here-Must-read-Articles-for-FUGA-Onboarding, support.fuga.com/hc/en-us/articles/28485420930324-FUGA-Webhooks-User-Guide, support.fuga.com/hc/en-us/articles/36909320032404-About-FUGA-Service-Offering, support.fuga.com/hc/en-us/articles/50684825679252-Managing-your-FUGA-API-credentials, support.fuga.com/hc/en-us/articles/8294717973268-DSP-Payout-Rates-How-Per-Stream-Amounts-Are-Calculated. Dimensions we could not source from one of their primary pages are omitted rather than guessed.

Their help centre documents a Primary Account with subaccounts beneath it. The API credentials tab “is visible when” the account “is a Primary Account. Subaccounts do not see the tab”, and “Subaccounts cannot create their own API credentials”. That is a coherent shape for an operator who wants credentials held in one place.

LabelGrid composes end-customer workspaces rather than inheriting them down a tree. Each one is a full workspace of identical capability with its own logins, created by the reseller, and the ceiling is published per plan: one label on Solo, three on Basic, five on Pro and fifty on Custom Distribution. On the API tiers the meter changes to end-customer portals rather than your own labels, at five on Starter API, twenty-five on Growth API, one hundred on Scale API and unlimited on Custom API. Those are two different meters, and it is worth reading which one you are sizing before you pick a tier.

The honest limit on our side: a B2B account here is also a conversation. API and third-party distribution require onboarding screening and KYC/KYB, Imprint is scoped at onboarding, and custom-deal numbers stay between the two parties. What you can read first is the ladder and the documentation.

Labels per plan

Solo carries one label, Basic three, Pro five and Custom Distribution fifty, all of it on the pricing page.

Portals per API tier

On the API tiers the count is end-customer portals: five, twenty-five, one hundred, and unlimited on Custom API.

Identical capability

Every end-customer workspace holds the same capability and its own logins rather than a reduced version of yours.

Where it goes custom

Past the published ceilings the deal is negotiated, and those numbers stay between the two parties.

Our WordPress plugin syncs releases, artists and download gates into your own site every six hours, and it is available to every account at no extra cost. The open-source MCP server on npm and the companion CLI run on that same public API, on an API plan, so an agent and the dashboard read the same catalogue.

Every distribution plan and every API tier is priced on the pricing page, and a self-serve plan starts with a seven-day free trial. What the plan carries is published with it: Dolby Atmos and hi-res masters delivered at no extra charge on every distribution plan and every API tier; ISRC and UPC codes at no extra cost and yours to keep; YouTube Content ID registration on all distribution plans; and automated royalty splits from Basic up and on every API tier.

On the money path, you keep 85% of standard-DSP royalties on Solo and Basic and 90% on Pro. On Custom Distribution and the API tiers you keep 95% of what you earn through LabelGrid’s own standard-DSP deals and 100% of what you earn on your own direct DSP deals or your own Merlin membership, with LabelGrid as infrastructure only. Content ID and UGC revenue carries a 20% fee on revenue earned through LabelGrid’s deals. LabelGrid charges nothing of its own to issue a payout, and statements run monthly in the platform through royalty accounting.

Every release on a distribution plan or an API tier is read by a person for quality, metadata and rights before it goes out, unless the account distributes only through its own direct deals, and that review is included rather than sold as an add-on.

Published rate

You keep 85% on Solo and Basic and 90% on Pro, with each rate stated on the pricing page.

Atmos and hi-res

Spatial-audio and high-resolution masters are delivered on every distribution plan and API tier at no extra charge.

Codes included

ISRC and UPC codes are assigned at no extra cost, and they stay yours if you leave.

Human review

A person checks the metadata and the rights before delivery on every distribution plan and API tier, at no extra cost, unless the account distributes only through its own direct deals.

Both companies sell a portal under your own brand, so the question is not whether one exists. It is how the account beneath it is shaped, and what either of us will tell you about the price before you talk to someone.

Their service-offering article describes “Remote Control Distribution” as “a ready-to-use custom-branded distribution platform powered by FUGA’s industry-leading technology”, and separately “Custom-Branded Distribution: Efficiently manage catalogs directly from your own client-facing platform.” Their remote controls are documented with “analytics via API, DDEX, or XML”. Some features sit with that product, which their help centre states plainly: “Note: this feature is exclusive to White Label clients.”

Imprint is our white-label portal: your brand on your own domain, with every end customer in its own workspace and its own logins rather than a view inside yours. Catalogue comes in through the platform or through Engine, our distribution API, with DDEX ERN import on the API plans and Custom Distribution, over 3.8.2, 4.3.0, 4.3.1 and 4.3.2, and royalty accounting covers the statements underneath. We scope Imprint at onboarding rather than publishing a price, which puts us on the same footing as them on this one product.

The published ladder is the floor of a conversation rather than its ceiling. Custom Distribution starts at 2,000 tracks by default and the cap is raised in the deal; caps, ceilings, platform fees and bespoke packaging are negotiable, and an operation running thousands of single-label artists is exactly the case that gets priced in bulk. The route is public and the numbers are not, which is worth knowing before you compare two quotations.

Our model costs you something too: composing a workspace per end customer is more structure to run than a single account with a view inside it, and it suits an operator with customers of their own rather than a label with one catalogue. If you want the portal alongside physical, marketing and neighbouring rights, FUGA publish all of that on their own pages. What we publish is the price of each distribution product, on the pricing page.

Engine, our distribution API puts the price of Starter API, Growth API and Scale API on the pricing page, with a starting price for Custom API, so you can size a build before you speak to anyone. The sandbox is the honest exception: LabelGrid enables it as part of the API upgrade, so it opens once an active paid plan is in place rather than during evaluation.

Catalogue moves over the platform on every distribution plan, over the Engine REST API on the four API tiers, and over DDEX ERN 3.8.2, 4.3.0, 4.3.1 and 4.3.2, where the direction is the thing to read before you plan a migration. We deliver over those four ERN versions on every plan. Import, as a one-time catalogue load or a continuous feed over SFTP or S3, runs on the API plans and on Custom Distribution, is not available on Solo, Basic or Pro, needs support to switch on, and carries a one-time setup fee wherever it is enabled.

Own the meters before they own you. Each standard API tier carries a track limit, a portal count and a monthly royalty processing cap of $35k, $115k or $350k, with Custom API’s cap set in the deal. Sustained excess above that cap has no overage fee attached, and it starts a tier-upgrade conversation instead. Each standard tier can add one pack of extra label portals through support, fixed at five on Starter, ten on Growth and twenty-five on Scale, and past one pack the answer is the next tier. Our MCP server is MIT-licensed on npm and the public MCP registry, with a CLI on the same API.

Published tier prices

Every API tier price, with its track limit, portal count and royalty cap, is on the pricing page, so you can size a tier before you talk to anyone.

Sandbox timing

The sandbox is enabled with the API upgrade, so it opens once the plan is active rather than before purchase.

Delivery and import

Delivery over ERN 3.8.2, 4.3.0, 4.3.1 and 4.3.2 on every plan; import on API plans and Custom Distribution.

Open-source tooling

The MCP server is MIT-licensed on npm and the public registry, and the CLI wraps the same public API.

Three places where FUGA is the better answer, taken from their own pages.

Their service offering lists physical distribution, marketing services and audio-visual services beside digital distribution. On physical, their team “manages every aspect of your physical release, from product ideation to campaign rollout”, including “packaging, stock control, and in-store strategy” for vinyl, CD and cassette. Their marketing team covers “everything from frontline and catalog pitching to audience development strategies”. A rights holder who wants all of that from one supplier should talk to them.

Their neighbouring rights page claims “We are a direct member of 30+ societies worldwide, enabling us to register catalogues directly in each territory”. Behind that sits the group: their knowledge base names “Downtown Music’s four core divisions – Publishing, Distribution, Artist & Label Services, and Royalties & Financial Services”, and their about page says “As part of Downtown Music, FUGA is now proudly part of Virgin Music Group.” If the recording side is one part of a larger need, that group reach is theirs to offer and worth weighing.

Most of what this page says about FUGA comes from their own public knowledge base, browsable without a login, with an onboarding path that names the articles a new client should read first and step-by-step guides for credentials, webhooks and Content ID. It is genuinely good, and it is why we can compare them fairly. On the white-label product itself neither company publishes a price, so on that one axis we are quote-only too.

We keep this section in every comparison we publish; a comparison you cannot trust is worth nothing.

Choose FUGA if you want the recording side and everything around it from one supplier: vinyl and CD manufacture through retail, a marketing team pitching frontline and catalogue, and neighbouring rights collection, with a group offering publishing and artist services behind them. Choose them if a setup scoped in conversation is how you prefer to buy, and if that reach matters to you more than reading a price on a web page.

Choose LabelGrid if distribution infrastructure is the thing you are actually buying, and if you would rather size the plan yourself from published numbers, price an API tier the same afternoon, and put every end customer in a workspace of their own. Neither answer is a criticism of the other. They are two companies sold to buyers who want different amounts of the music business under one contract.

You size it yourself

You want the plan ladder, the meters and the API tier prices in front of you before the first call.

You resell distribution

Your customers need their own workspaces and logins, with a published ceiling per plan rather than a quotation.

Your own deals on Custom Distribution and the API tiers

On Custom Distribution and the API tiers you keep 100% on your own direct DSP deals or Merlin membership.

You build on the API

Published tier prices, delivery over DDEX ERN 3.8.2, 4.3.0, 4.3.1 and 4.3.2, an MIT-licensed MCP server and a CLI on the same API.

Ask these of FUGA, of LabelGrid and of anyone else on your shortlist. They are the questions whose answers change the bill or the migration, and every one of them is answered somewhere on our own site.

01Ask what the plan is metered by, whether that is tracks, labels, end-customer portals or royalties processed, and what happens at the moment you cross a meter rather than at renewal.

02Ask whether you can read the price of the product you actually want without a call, and if not, ask which parts of the commercial terms will only ever appear inside a quotation.

03Ask whether human release review is included in the plan or sold as an add-on, and what happens to a release that does not pass it.

04Ask which DDEX ERN versions are supported, and ask separately about delivery and about import, because the two directions often carry different plan scope and different setup costs.

05Ask when a sandbox becomes available to you, before purchase or once the plan is active, and what credentials and test data you get to work with.

06Ask how the account is shaped for your customers: one account with views inside it, or a workspace each with its own logins, and who is allowed to hold API credentials.

07Ask what happens to your catalogue and your statements if you leave, and confirm that the ISRCs and UPCs already assigned stay with you.

Every distribution plan and every API tier is priced on the pricing page, and Imprint is quoted at onboarding. Each FUGA value in the table above comes from one of the pages linked beneath it, read on 23 September 2026. If any of it is wrong or out of date, tell us and we will fix it.