ElevenLabs ElevenMusic Mixes: New AI Music Tool Explained
If you’ve been wondering whether ElevenLabs — the voice AI company — is serious about music, the answer is yes, and they just made a louder move than anyone expected. ElevenMusic Mixes is the latest piece of a stack ElevenLabs has been building since August 2025, aimed straight at Suno and Udio.
I’ll walk you through what it actually does, what it costs, how the licensing works, and where it falls short. I’ve pulled from the official ElevenLabs blog, TechCrunch, Billboard, and Music Business Worldwide, so every number is dated and clickable.
What Is ElevenMusic Mixes?
ElevenMusic Mixes is ElevenLabs’ consumer-facing music app and platform that lets you generate full songs, split them into editable stems, and remix tracks from a catalog of 4,000+ independent artists.
It launched on iOS on April 1, 2026 and as a web platform on April 29, 2026, per TechCrunch. The “Mixes” name covers three things: AI music generation, stem separation, and a remix layer over an existing catalog.
Here’s the part that matters: ElevenLabs is positioning this as a fan-engagement platform, not just a generator. Kevin Jonas Sr., quoted in ElevenLabs’ April 29, 2026 launch blog post, said the company is trying to give fans “a way in, turning a song into something people can step into, not just listen to.”
A Quick Timeline So You Know What’s What
ElevenLabs didn’t ship ElevenMusic once. They shipped it in pieces, and the names get confusing. Let me clear that up.
- August 5, 2025 — ElevenLabs launches Eleven Music (two words), the underlying AI model, with licensing deals from Kobalt and Merlin.
- December 22, 2025 — Stems separation, Inpainting API, and improved lyrics go live in the ElevenLabs Music update.
- March 19, 2026 — Music Marketplace launches, letting creators publish and earn from AI tracks.
- April 1–2, 2026 — ElevenMusic iOS app drops quietly on the App Store.
- April 29, 2026 — ElevenMusic (one word, the platform) officially launches with 4,000+ artists.
- May 26, 2026 — Music v2 model ships, with mid-track genre switching and a longer-form composer.
What Can You Actually Do With It?
The “Mixes” feature is the remix engine. You start with any track in the ElevenMusic catalog, change genre, tempo, or mood, and the model regenerates a new version while keeping the structure intact. You can also start from a prompt, get a full song back, and then pull it apart.
Here are the things that work right now, based on ElevenLabs’ documentation and the December 2025 update:
- Full songs with vocals — multi-language (English, Spanish, German, Japanese), up to 5 minutes long.
- Instrumental tracks — cinematic scores, ambient lo-fi, anything promptable.
- Stem separation — split into 2, 4, or 6 stems. Vocals, drums, bass, and “others” are clean enough to drop into a DAW.
- Inpainting API — select any section and regenerate just that part. The bridge can change while the chorus stays untouched.
- Section-by-section building — generate a 30-second intro, then add a verse, then a chorus, with the model keeping continuity.
- Lyrics editing — change words in any section, regenerate that bit, keep the rest.
“A single song can move from opera to heavy metal and back, sustain fast rap and dense lyrical delivery, and embed non-musical sound effects directly within the track, all without breaking musical coherence.” — ElevenLabs blog, May 26, 2026
That quote is the pitch for Music v2, the new model that powers most of this as of June 2026. It’s a real step up from v1 in vocal quality, arrangement, and prompt adherence.
How Much Does ElevenMusic Cost?
ElevenMusic lives inside the broader ElevenLabs subscription, which runs from free to $990/month — and stem separation is a paid add-on billed as a multiplier of generation cost.
Here’s the current plan breakdown, straight from ElevenLabs’ pricing page:
| Plan | Monthly Price | Music Commercial Use | Credits/mo |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | No | 10k |
| Starter | $6 | Yes | 30k |
| Creator | $11 (50% off month 1) | Yes | 121k |
| Pro | $99 | Yes | 600k |
| Scale | $299 | Yes | 1.8M |
| Business | $990 | Yes | 6M |
The dedicated iOS app has its own pricing tier reported by TechCrunch on April 2, 2026: $9.99/month or $95.90/year for a Pro tier that unlocks 500 tracks per month, 500GB storage, and full style access. Free users get 7 songs per day.
Stem separation pricing comes from the December 2025 blog post: 2 stems costs 0.5× your normal generation cost, 4 stems costs 1×, and 6 stems is the deepest option.
Can You Legally Use the Music You Make?
Yes, on any paid ElevenLabs plan — every track is “cleared for broad commercial use,” according to ElevenLabs’ own music documentation.
This is the whole reason ElevenLabs is in a different position than Suno or Udio. Eleven Music is trained on licensed data through deals with:
- Merlin — the indie label digital licensing org.
- Kobalt — the music publisher.
- SourceAudio — pre-cleared song dataset (per the original Billboard report, August 2025).
- Believe — distribution partner, mentioned in the Music v2 announcement on May 26, 2026.
That last one matters. As Billboard reported on April 29, 2026, Kobalt artists will get a “pro-rata share of a royalty pool based on how many of their works were used to train the Eleven Music model,” weighted by streaming popularity on other platforms.
Compare that to Suno, where UMG and Sony asked a federal court on May 21, 2026 to add 61,026 recordings to their copyright lawsuit after discovery revealed Suno trained on “millions” of their tracks. Udio, meanwhile, settled with UMG on October 29, 2025 and agreed to build a licensed platform.
So when people say ElevenLabs is “the safe one,” they’re not wrong. You can drop a generated track into a YouTube ad or a game without expecting a takedown.
ElevenMusic vs Suno vs Udio vs the Rest
Here’s how the major AI music tools stack up as of June 2026:
| Tool | Max Length | Vocal Quality | Commercial Use | Lawsuit Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ElevenLabs Music v2 | 5 min | Strong | Yes, all paid plans | None |
| Suno v5.5 | ~4 min | Best-in-class | Yes, paid plans | Active — 61k+ recordings |
| Udio | Re-launched 2026 | Strong | Yes (post-settlement) | Settled UMG Oct 2025 |
| Google Lyria 3 Pro | 3 min | Good | Limited | None |
| Stability Stable Audio 3.0 | 6 min | Limited vocals | Yes (open weights) | None |
Suno still wins on raw vocal quality — most reviewers in 2026 agree on this. ElevenLabs wins on licensing clarity and stem separation depth. Google Lyria 3 Pro launched March 25, 2026 and integrates into Flow Music, per the Google blog. Stability AI’s Stable Audio 3.0 launched May 20, 2026 and goes up to 6 minutes but leans instrumental.
Where ElevenMusic Actually Wins
Three things stand out after using the platform for a few days.
1. Stems that don’t suck. Most AI music tools give you a finished track and that’s it. ElevenLabs lets you split into up to 6 stems (vocals, drums, bass, others), and the separation is clean enough to remix in FL Studio. They partnered with FL Studio on December 9, 2025 to make this workflow smoother.
2. Section-level editing. The Inpainting API is the killer feature. You highlight the bridge, type “make this more melancholic,” and the rest of the song doesn’t move. Try that with Suno and you’ll regenerate the whole thing.
3. The Marketplace. You can publish a track to ElevenLabs’ Music Marketplace and earn when other paid users remix or license it. The model already paid out $11M+ to voice creators, as of March 2026, and the music side is built on the same rails.
Where It’s Still Rough
I’d be lying if I said it was perfect. A few honest gripes:
- No Suno-level vocals yet. Music v2 improved things dramatically, but if you want a radio-ready vocal, Suno v5.5 is still the leader.
- iOS app is iPhone only. No Android app as of June 2026.
- Catalog is mostly emerging artists. The 4,000+ artists are indie-leaning — don’t expect major-label hits to show up for remixing.
- The “Pro” model that Kobalt and Merlin were supposed to help build is still described as “under development” or “coming soon” in ElevenLabs’ own announcements from August 2025 and onward.
- Earnings are opaque. Music Marketplace royalty terms are hidden in their Creator Royalty Terms, and payouts depend on “listener engagement, eligibility thresholds, and platform revenue.”
How to Use ElevenMusic in 5 Steps
If you’re new to the platform, here’s the shortest path from zero to a finished, commercially cleared AI track. I pulled this from the ElevenLabs Music documentation and the December 2025 feature update.
- Sign up at elevenlabs.io — Free tier gets you started with 10k credits per month. Paid plans start at $6/month.
- Write a detailed prompt — Include genre, mood, instrumentation, tempo, and use case. The docs recommend layered prompts like “Upbeat funk track with a prominent slap bass line, funky rhythm guitar, and a horn section” instead of just “funk.”
- Generate at least two variants — Pick the best base to iterate on. Start with a 30-second clip rather than a full song.
- Add sections one at a time — Use the ”+ Add Section” button to build your song section by section: intro, verse, chorus, bridge. This gives you control over structure.
- Export or split into stems — Download the full MP3, or pull 2, 4, or 6 stems for use in a DAW like FL Studio.
Total time from signup to finished track: about 20 minutes if your prompt is good.
Quick FAQ
Is ElevenMusic really free? Yes. The free tier gives you 10k credits/month and access to the generator. You can’t use the output commercially on free — you need at least the $6 Starter plan for that.
Can I publish ElevenMusic tracks on Spotify? Yes, on any paid plan. The Music Marketplace is the recommended distribution path, but you can also upload directly to a distributor.
Does ElevenLabs own my generated tracks? No. On paid plans, you own the output and can use it commercially per ElevenLabs’ Music Terms.
How is this different from Suno? Licensing. Suno is in active litigation with UMG and Sony over 61,000+ recordings as of May 2026. ElevenLabs trained on licensed data and has deals with Merlin, Kobalt, SourceAudio, and Believe.
What’s the catch? Vocals. Suno still produces more natural-sounding singing voices. ElevenLabs wins on stem quality, section editing, and licensing clarity.
Should You Try It?
Here’s my honest take. If you need commercial-safe AI music and don’t want to think about licensing, ElevenMusic is the safest pick. Pay the $6 Starter plan, generate a track, split it into stems, drop the instrumental into your video, done.
If you’re a producer who cares about vocal realism more than licensing clarity, you might still prefer Suno for finished songs and pull from ElevenLabs for stem workflows.
Either way, ElevenLabs just raised $500M at an $11B valuation in February 2026, led by Sequoia. They’re not going anywhere, and Music v2 is clearly just the start. The AI music market is on track to hit $18.04 billion by 2035, growing at 28.5% CAGR. ElevenLabs is building to be the licensed, artist-friendly incumbent.
Short version: ElevenMusic Mixes is real, it’s licensed, the stems are useful, and the vocals are catching up. Don’t expect it to replace your favorite producer yet.
Sources used in this article:
- ElevenLabs — Introducing Music v2 (May 26, 2026)
- ElevenLabs — Introducing ElevenMusic (April 29, 2026)
- ElevenLabs — Music update with stems and inpainting (Dec 22, 2025)
- TechCrunch — Music v2 launch coverage (May 27, 2026)
- TechCrunch — ElevenMusic iOS app (April 2, 2026)
- Billboard — ElevenMusic platform launch (April 29, 2026)
- Music Business Worldwide — Music Marketplace launch (March 23, 2026)
- Music Business Worldwide — Eleven Music launch with Kobalt/Merlin (Aug 5, 2025)
- Music Business Worldwide — Suno 61k recordings lawsuit (May 26, 2026)
- Universal Music Group — Udio settlement (Oct 29, 2025)
- ElevenLabs Pricing
- ElevenLabs Music Documentation
- Business Research Insights — AI Music Generator Market 2026