26 Great Royalty-Free Tracks for Podcasts

Introduction: Music and Podcasts, a Perfect Match

Music can make a podcast snappier, more memorable, and more emotional. But do you know where you’re going to source your music? It’s possible to produce an interview podcast at home with minimal resources, but a lot harder to come up with a polished musical track on a shoestring. And it can be next to impossible to license music if it comes with copyright and clearance issues.

Fortunately, there is a solution. Royalty-free music is music that allows you to pay a one-off license fee, which you can then use forever and in as many different ways as you like.

With royalty-free music, you can access the work of talented musicians from around the world, affordably and easily.

Here are some of the best royalty-free tracks we’ve found to help power your podcast along!

1. Robot Dreams, by Bruce Zimmerman

This cool, propulsive track uses ambient synthesizers and percussion to set a driving beat with a modern edge. If your podcast is about some aspect of technology or life in the twenty-first century, this might be the track for you. It’s relatively fast-paced, but also has a  meditative quality. With enough variation to provide you with different parts to use over the course of your podcast, Robot Dreams feels edgy and of the moment.

2. Unsolved Crime Show 1.0, by The Sound Room

Haunting and eerie, this track is elegant, dreamy, and hypnotic. Its synthesizers, percussion, and piano evoke a sense of deepening mystery. If your show delves into unsolved crimes and the past, consider the haunting and slightly magical Unsolved Crime Show 1.0. Its sense of richly ambient immersion will lend your podcast a sense of depth and production value.

3. Moogy One, by The Sound Room

Moogy One is a groovy, funky track played on organ, electric guitar, and synthesizer. It has a funky, driving beat, and could be used in contexts ranging from joyful to ominous. It has a powerful, hypnotic feeling, piquing interest with some unexpected flourishes, like turntable scratches and wah-wah guitar.

Moogy One has some heavy guitar that recalls the hits of bands like Cream. You could use it to send an audience back through time to the 1970s, make them feel like they’re in a classic talk show audience or at a disco or, more darkly, as the track notes suggest, in a more ghostly context: “you’ve been placed face down in a crumbling path of stone floating in endless space. As you get up, you can see a gate in front of you, and nothingness behind you… a groovy tune plays in your head,  and the music begins to surge in your veins and give you power.”

Whether you’re in the mood for Halloween or Harlem disco, Moogy One offers an evocative, groove-tastic time.

4. Mime Mol, by The Sound Room

Mime Mol puts your audience in a world of funk, with jazzy, joyful horns, and snazzy, groovy guitars. You could use it for a talk podcast and feel like Arsenio in his heyday. It’s in a major key, giving it an upbeat feeling, and Mime Mol has a great call-and-response section with heavy electric guitar and horns & brass. It conjures up the best of world music, like a vintage Tito Puento track, with a big New Orleans sound and a Latin tinge. It has some nice, heavy electric funk guitar, too, and a bit of a funky break, as well as some idiosyncratic, almost sci-fi percussion that could give energy to any podcast.

5. Limon Al Molusco Remix, by The Sound Room

It’s a world music rave with the layered Limon Al Molusco Remix. It feels like you’re dropping into a giant warehouse party in Bushwick or Berlin – or the beginning of a trip into an alternate dimension. The remix is urban, chaotic, pulsing, and complex, with vocal samples and an energetic, exuberant sound. It’s got drums, synths, electric guitar, and conjures a world of trippy explosiveness. It’s great royalty-free background music for your interview or for other podcasts.

With some sultry and higher key Spanish-language rapping and some classic turntable record scratches, its big and spacious feeling transports you through a European club… or maybe another dimension.

It’s a bit reminiscent of the sound of 90s action movies like Run Lola Run. Feel your pulse increase as it takes you on a journey through the back alleys of European cities, running as fast as you can. This track would go really well with an action-inspired podcast, or if you wanted to give a feeling of global relevance to current affairs or news shows.

6. Limon Al Molusco, by the Sound Room

The original Limon Al Molusco track has a similar Euro-energy as the remix, but with a more rock-and-roll vibe. In the words of the track notes, “your brain has just been zapped by the magical powers of rock. As your physical body turns to a jumbled mess, your spirit transcends into another dimension of awesome music”.

The keyboards feel funky and give way to a haunting, eerie, cymbal-infused meditative chorus, giving just the right note of curiosity and Frank Zappa-tinged mystery to a science fiction exploration or an all-out freakout or fantasy narrative. The melodic breakdown gives way to an upbeat, resolute march, which could be put to great use in a true-crime show – it feels like justice being served.

It’s music without vocals and so would sound great with some narration over it. As the track notes have it, “we followed the leads to a weird club on the edge of the planet… and there found something that blew our minds.” Let this track inspire your own imagination!

7. La Nota Po, by the Sound Room

Big horns give this track a glossy, Peter Gunn kind of vibe. If your show needs some brightening and a crashing chorus of percussion and brass, La Nota Po is the track for you.

Starting more rapidly paced, then slowing down for some soulful dance floor time, the track concludes with upbeat “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” Bobby McFerrin vibes. La Nota Po suggests the coolest little Latin café you’ve ever stepped into. Parts of it – like its cool, soaring trumpet solo – could be just the thing to give your podcast a sense of panache and continental or Latin American sophistication. There’s a rip-roaring sax solo, too, evoking a classic 80s action movie a la Lethal Weapon. This is a very versatile track with so many possible uses. It’s simply a very fun listen and offers many possibilities for happy podcast soundtracking.

8. La Dejada De Ir Remix, by the Sound Room

La Dejada De Ir Remix evokes dancing on a beach in the middle of a sultry, groovy daytime dance party. It’s New Year’s Day, everyone has a drink, and you can practically smell the ocean and feel the exuberance of a great summer grilling session. It starts nicely slowly, with horns and brass, then builds to a climactic jam with fun party vocals (“check it out!”) and a throbbing bass line. If you want your podcast to get a party going, Le Dejada De Ir Remix is the bongo-powered track that will make you get up and dance… and maybe wish you had a Cuban cigar and mojito in hand.

9. La Dejada De Ir, by the Sound Room

La Dejada De Ir, the non-remixed version, is every bit as funky as the remix but feels a bit more intimate. The party’s smaller and the beach in Mexico is more chill. There’s a live band playing brass, funky guitar, and the hi-hat drum for that extra-fun percussive sizzle. It has a relaxed quality, with a playful, happy, sultry energy – but a nicely modulated ending has a big funky breakdown. It would make for a fun closing track to round out the end of any podcast, and it’s great royalty-free interview music, too.

10. La Conversion (Dr. Zupreeme Remix), by the Sound Room

La Conversion (Dr. Zupreeme Remix) is a trip. As the notes have it, “swirling images of anything you can imagine start to cloud your vision. Memories of this strange world of music start invading your brain and trying to take control. Hold on for dear life…”. It’s psychedelic, it’s got a great beat, and a sense of deepening mystery.

La Conversion (Dr. Zupreeme Remix) has an edgy, haunting vibe and some funky synths that hint at the 1970s – but also the future. With some awesomely hypnotic claps, it could be the perfect soundtrack for a retro-futuristic crime show – but also segues into some deep, trip-hop-inspired Brooklyn beats.

If you want to take your audience on a journey or fill out the scene of a dark, moody club in your audience’s imagination, this is the track for you.

11. La Conversion, by the Sound Room

Unremixed, La Conversion has a swinging, jazzy Latin charm all of its own, guaranteed to get your audience dancing (at least in their seats with their headphones on). It’s an energetic and undeniably happy track that could evoke the world of 70s police shows or any gritty but fun urban milieu. It’s exuberant and joyous, with expansive horn solos, and some electric keyboard that brings the funk, while the percussion brings the noise.

12. Jit Jop, by The Sound Room

Jit Jop is deep in David Lynch territory. Weird, dreamy, intense, but nonetheless hypnotic and hard to turn away from, Jit Jop feels at once like a TV theme and a hallucination. The electric guitar intensifies soulfully over a landscape of industrial blips and samples. Ghostly Latin American vocals and tinkling piano combine to create something idiosyncratic and compelling.

Let the track’s dreaminess take you by surprise – and be rewarded by a Gothic, retro-churchy organ providing the sample underneath some Spanish spoken word, and some very big-sounding wailing vocals.

Is it Spanish Church-Hop? Neo-Prog Kate Bush-inflected Andrew Lloyd Webber-esque pop opera? Whatever you call it – it’s pretty cool.

13. Highway to Los Iguanos, by The Sound Room

You’re on the Highway to Los Iguanos and it’s taking you through one groovy, entrancing desert landscape. It starts amid succulents and tumbleweeds, then takes you to a little roadside church or cantina, where the tequila is starting to flow, and the electric guitar and female singers are getting the party started. The synthesizers give this track a spacious sound and conjure a landscape that could go on forever in every direction. The female rap gives it a unique vibe and a tasty Tex-Mex road trip flavor.

14. El Extractor Funk Remix, by The Sound Room

El Extractor Funk Remix is a cool, hip hop-inflected funk tune with a nice balance of electric guitar, drums, a backing chorus, and a deep Barry White-growling Spanish lead vocal, doing his thing with a sensual whisper.

15. El Extractor Hydro Remix, by the Sound Room

The El Extractor Hydro Remix takes the same basic material and gives it a chill, EDM makeover. It’s a hypnotic track somewhere between a meditation backing track and the song that gets everyone moving in a trancey dance party.

16. El Extractor, by The Sound Room

El Extractor, unremixed, feels like the theme to your favorite 70s cop show. With an insistent, pulsing beat taken over by some whizzing synths and wah-wah guitar, this track could give some extra oomph to any podcast. It’s funky, energetic, and soulful, with some beautiful, wailing sax.

17. El Clavo, by The Sound Room

El Clavo is a happy, awesome number that makes you feel like you’ve stumbled upon the world’s best jam band in a Mexican jazz club. It feels a bit like a joyous wedding, too, complete with an exuberant sax solo.

18. El Clan, by The Sound Room

El Clan adds a little bit of mystery and magic to its Latin hip-hop. It’s got sinuous, groovy horns, and draws you into its funky beat with a mesmerizing, rhythmic Latin spoken-word rap. It’s world music with bounce and a real sense of cool.

19. El Caracol, by The Sound Room

This is a more meditative, reflective track, with some driving, echoing beats, and a relaxed globe-trotting vibe. It feels slick – as if you were floating above the clouds. It could work really well with a travel or fashion podcast.

20. Crucero Bicentanario, by The Sound Room

A funky, percussive, slightly chaotic jam that’s nonetheless bound to get your toes tapping and the party started. It feels happy, epic, and globe-trotting. It could work to set a rapid pace or kick off a podcast on a note of high energy.

21. Crucero, by The Sound Room

This one starts soft, quiet, and jazzy, à la NPR. It then builds with a sense of sweep and playfulness that is genuinely winning. With a swinging rhythm, using Crucero with your podcast could make it feel like you have a seriously groovy, virtuosic house band.

22. Como Alma Que Lleva El Diablo, by The Sound Room

This is one sweeping, rocking track. Evocative of Tarantino, it layers ripe samples of dialogue from Mexican movies over its driving rhythmic funk. Some intensely cinematic strings with big, swelling crescendoes bring shades of classic James Bond and other adventure scores, while the high-energy samples are just really damn cool. This would be the perfect score for a classic movies podcast. It’s not just royalty-free background music; it makes you feel like you’re sitting in the coolest darkened movie theater you can imagine.

23. Chicotito Groove Mami (Movil Project Remix), by The Sound Room

Latin dance tracks don’t come much more funky, spiky, or danceable than this one. If you have a fondness for classic 90s hip hop (like Pump Up The Jam), you may fall hard for this simple but extremely catchy party track. It’s royalty-free music that’s mellow and guaranteed to put a smile on your face.

24. Chicotito Groove, by The Sound Room

Sans remix, Chicotito Groove has a lot more bass, sax, and bongo, and a nicely gritty vibe. Mexican rock and a virtuosic sax could lend your podcast a slick sheen and a soulful groove. A jazzy breakdown regroups for a big trumpet solo that will keep your audiences mesmerized if you’re looking to add verve and emotion.

25. Burro En Primavera, by The Sound Room

This sweet track, in spite of its slightly risqué title, takes you to a quiet, intimate jazz club in Buenos Aires or even Paris. It feels bubbly and sophisticated, with continental flair and a hint of tango in its use of accordion.

26. Amanecers, by The Sound Room

If you’ve been missing live, funky jazz during the pandemic, this track brings it right back. It has a joyful, confident swing and its saxophone solo makes you feel like you’re in a sweaty club – in the best way.

Royalty-Free Musical Conclusions

Whatever musical style you’re seeking for your podcast, Stock Music has got you covered. Instead of dealing with the irritations of copyright and clearances, it lets you get your interview music royalty-free. You can use these tracks for YouTube – or anywhere you like.

Stock Music features a wide range of genres, styles, and instrumentation, and you can even search by emotional tone. Music is the best way to add heft and production value to your podcast, so get your audience bopping their heads along with your content, and find some musical inspiration at Stock Music today!