Help / Licensing & trial
What the free allowance covers, and how it is counted
Free plays your whole library forever, and hands you a real, measured amount of the heavy library tools on top. This page sets out how much you get, what counts as one, and what happens at the end.
What is metered, and what is not
Six things draw on an allowance. Everything else is either free for everyone or a Lifetime unlock, and none of it ever touches playback.
| What you are doing | Free | During the 30-day trial |
|---|---|---|
| Super-Tag matching a track, and the MusicBrainz release applied to a CD you have just ripped | 100 tracks | 1,000 tracks |
| Ripping a CD | 5 discs | 20 discs |
| Scanning a track for ReplayGain | 100 tracks | 1,000 tracks |
| Saving tags across more than one track at once | 25 tracks | 250 tracks |
| Moving duplicate copies to quarantine from Library Health | Not included | 250 copies |
| Saving a Rediscover Mix as a playlist | Not included | 30 mixes |
Super-Tag and the release the app applies after a CD rip share a single budget, because they draw on the same metadata work. Applying a MusicBrainz match to a single track in the tag editor is not metered at all.
An active Pro or Lifetime licence is not metered either. A paid licence that has been offline long enough to need re-verifying sits on the free allowance until it checks in, and your music plays throughout. See Using the app offline and Free, Pro & Lifetime.
What counts as one
The counting is deliberately narrow, and in most cases you are charged only for work that landed.
- Super-Tag charges only the tracks it tags. A track that already carries a MusicBrainz match is skipped, and a skip is free. See Super-Tag.
- A CD rip counts as one disc, and only once the ripped tracks have landed in your library. A rip that fails, or that you stop before a single track finishes, costs nothing. Stop it after tracks have saved and it does count, because those tracks are yours. See Rip a CD to your library.
- A ReplayGain scan counts one per track the scan takes on, whether or not that track ends up with a gain written. In album mode the allowance never splits an album in half, because half an album gets a wrong album gain. Stop a scan part way and you are charged only for what it measured.
- Saving tags to several tracks at once counts only the tracks actually written. A file that is locked, or that fails its read-back check, costs nothing. Editing one track at a time is not metered. See The tag editor.
- Moving duplicates to quarantine counts one per copy actually moved. A copy that fails to move costs nothing, and a batch you cancel part way costs only what had already landed.
- Saving a Rediscover Mix counts one per mix actually saved, and only once its playlist has been written. A save that fails costs nothing, and ordinary playlists you build yourself are never metered. See Playlists.
What happens when you reach a cap
Nothing locks, nothing is taken back, and your music does not stop. What you have already tagged, ripped or fixed stays yours.
Most of these tools do as much as the allowance covers, then stop and leave the rest for a later run. Super-Tag, the ReplayGain scanner and multi-track tag saves all work that way, and each tells you how many it managed. Super-Tag warns you up front when a run is larger than what you have left, so a long sweep is never a surprise.
Ripping a CD and the duplicate move are checked before they begin, so they either run in full or not at all. For ripping that is on purpose: you find out first, rather than after a ten-minute read. Saving a mix is a single action, so there is nothing to run part way.
When an allowance is used up, a small panel appears saying so, with See Pro and Not now. No countdown, no timed pop-up, and never over playback.
How the counting works
- The numbers are running totals, not per batch and not per session. Five free rips means five in all, not five each time you open the app.
- They are kept per machine, outside your library database, so rebuilding your library or reinstalling the app does not hand you a fresh allowance.
- The trial keeps its own separate count. Trial use never carries across, so a trial that ends leaves you on a full, untouched free allowance. See Your free trial.
What is never metered
- Playback. Your whole library, always, on every tier and in every licence state, including the reconnect state above.
- The graphic and parametric EQ, crossfeed, CUE sheets, and the signal path badge.
- Library Health scanning and flagging, and reviewing duplicates side by side. What costs is the quarantine move you confirm at the end. Library Health is also a doorway to two metered tools: Scan RG spends the ReplayGain allowance, and its Super-Tag actions spend the Super-Tag one. See Library Health & finding duplicates.
- Remote streaming. Free, with no device limit, however many phones and tablets you connect. See Stream your library to your phone.
One setting is worth knowing: switch on Auto-calculate ReplayGain in Settings and its background pass spends the same ReplayGain allowance. It is off by default.
WASAPI Exclusive output, Analyze Quality and Discogs enrichment are Lifetime unlocks, not metered allowances, so there is no free taste to spend on them.
If a count looks wrong, use Report a Bug in the app. Is this a bug? How to report it explains what that sends.