eMastered vs LANDR, with Bounce Sessions alongside

What each service publishes

Bounce Sessions sells mastering too, so it sits in this table on the same terms as the other two. Everything here comes from each company’s own pages. We haven’t run a listening test or ranked anyone, and nothing on this page says one service sounds better than another.

Prices read 1 November 2026. All are in US dollars, as shown in the United States. LANDR is running a Black Friday sale on its yearly Studio plans with no end date shown, so its regular prices sit beside the sale prices. eMastered says plans and features may vary by region, and our paid plans and downloads aren’t on sale in every country yet.

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What a batch of songs costs on each service

Take 12 finished songs, all delivered as WAV. A subscription’s cost per song depends on how many you finish while you’re paying for it, so read what each line assumes. The sums are ours, from the prices above, before any tax. They count mastering only, not a plan’s other contents.

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LANDR prints monthly figures and no yearly total, so its yearly line is 12 times the monthly figure. Check the checkout before paying. Left out: Essentials, which is MP3 only; eMastered’s $14 plan, whose one-year commitment comes to $168; and the yearly plans for LANDR Studio Pro and Bounce Sessions, which at this count cost more than buying singly on the same service. Our own monthly plan isn’t in this table; its price is in the first one.

Before you plan on one paid month, check what happens when it ends. This is what each company says.

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Whichever you use, download every file before the period ends.

Is LANDR mastering good?

Nobody can answer that in general, and that includes us. It depends on the mix. A quieter, more dynamic master is right for one song and wrong for the next, and a brighter one can suit one mix and tire you on another. LANDR and eMastered both publish testimonials, which tell you about other people’s songs. The same goes for eMastered and for us.

You can find out for your own music, though: master the same mix on each service and listen at the same loudness. The matching matters because otherwise the louder file can win on level alone.

How to test them on your own mix

Compare masters is our free tool, with no account needed. It plays two audio files in sync, turns the louder one down to the level of the quieter one, and lets you switch between them. It only works on files you hold, and none of the three free previews gives you a file. So there’s no free side-by-side: the previews are free, and the matched test costs money.

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Comparing eMastered with LANDR on a single song comes to $44: a $34 month and a $10 master. Adding Bounce Sessions adds $4.99. Without eMastered, the test is a $10 master at LANDR and a $4.99 one here.

• Export one mixChoose one finished song and export one WAV. Upload that same file everywhere, so the service is the only thing that changes. Our export guide covers the settings.
• Listen to each free previewIt costs nothing and may rule one out. These previews run on separate sites and aren’t matched to each other, so use them to drop a result you don’t want, not to settle a close call.
• Buy only the files still in the runningChoose the settings you’d really release with, and compare like with like. LANDR’s $10 master is a 16-bit WAV, and eMastered and Bounce Sessions both offer a 16-bit 44.1 kHz WAV.
• Load two files into Compare mastersPut one in First master and one in Second master. Both are measured in your browser, and your audio isn’t uploaded.
• Listen with Match loudness onPress Play and switch between A and B while the song runs. Turn Match loudness off once to hear what level alone changes.
• Read the differences, then swap in a thirdThe tool shows loudness, true peak, range, tone balance and stereo width for each file, and flags problems such as clipping. It says what’s different and never which is better. It holds two files at a time, so keep the one you prefer and choose another file for the other slot. One song only tells you about that song, so try a second if your budget allows.

Which option fits your budget and release plan

Nothing to spend yet. All three previews are free, so you can hear your song on each before paying anyone.

One song, once. LANDR at $10 and Bounce Sessions at $4.99 are single payments with nothing to cancel. eMastered has no single download, so it starts with a plan.

A batch of finished songs, then a quiet spell. One paid month can cover it if every song is final and you download inside that month, and the cost table has each service’s figure. Buying single masters has no renewal to stop.

Songs through the year. Single masters or a yearly plan both suit this, where the service sells them. What a plan comes to per song depends on how many you finish, and the first table has each yearly price.

Distribution on the same bill. eMastered and LANDR include it, with their own limits. eMastered’s fair usage policy sets one artist profile and 20 new recordings per rolling 30 days; LANDR’s plans cover 1, 3 or 5 artists. They differ when a plan ends: eMastered says you can’t keep releases on streaming platforms once a subscription has expired, and LANDR says releases stay live and it takes a 15% commission on royalties. Bounce Sessions doesn’t offer distribution, so you’d use a separate distributor.

Songs that have to hold together as a record. LANDR publishes an album mastering feature, and we haven’t tested what it does. eMastered lists none on the pages we read. Bounce Sessions masters each song on its own and does not balance songs as a record. If yours needs that, personal mastering is the route here, and our automated or personal guide helps you decide.