How much should you charge for a feature in 2026?

Somebody sent you a track and asked what you charge for a verse. If your first instinct was to guess a number and hope it was not too high, you are in good company, and you are also about to answer the wrong question.

The number is downstream. The real question is whether this is a fee deal or a split deal, because those are two different transactions with two different sets of paperwork, and the amount only makes sense once you have picked one.

Fee or split is the actual question

A fee is work for hire. You write and record a verse, you get paid, you walk away. Clean, immediate, no upside.

A split makes you part-owner of the song. No money changes hands up front and you hold a share of what the record earns, forever.

The two are not opposites and plenty of real deals are both: a modest fee plus a writing share. What matters is that you decide which shape this is before anyone opens a session, because a fee deal wants an invoice and a split deal wants a split sheet, and reverse-engineering the paperwork afterwards is how friendships end.

No fee plus a split is a real deal

Say this part plainly, because a lot of pricing advice quietly assumes every feature is a paid gig and it makes independent artists feel like they are being lowballed when they are not.

The modal independent collaboration is no fee plus a split. It is the normal shape of this market below the level where a label budget exists. It is not a discount, not a favour, and not a red flag on its own. Two people who both think the record is good take a share of it instead of moving money that neither of them has.

Taking a split rather than a fee is the right call when:

• You genuinely like the song, which is not a small thing. You will be attached to it forever.
• The other artist has a real audience or real momentum, so the share has a chance of being worth something.
• You want the credit and the association more than you want $200 this month.

Take the fee instead when the rent is the actual issue, when the record is nothing to do with your own lane, or when you have no confidence it will ever come out. Roughly three-quarters of started collaborations never get released, and a fee is paid whether or not the song does.

What a feature is worth at each stage

There is no rate card, and anyone showing you one is guessing. What actually sets the price is what you bring to the record, and that comes down to three things: a measurable draw, a distinctive sound the song needs, and reliability.

Peer level, no measurable draw. Split, or a token fee. Both of you are buying the same thing, which is a better song and a co-sign from someone whose taste you respect. Do not manufacture a fee to feel professional.

Local artist with a real draw. Low hundreds is the common shape, and it is often a fee plus a small writing share. “Real draw” means numbers you can show: ticket scans from your last show, a presale link that converted, a settlement report. Not followers, which cost about five dollars a thousand and everybody knows it.

Regional artist with tour history and streaming that holds up. Meaningfully more, and now the conversation includes things beyond the verse: whether you are in the video, whether you perform it live, whether the other artist can use your name in the marketing.

Above that you are into manager and lawyer territory, and the deal stops being a text message.

The thing to internalise: price on what you bring to the record, not on what you think you are worth in general. A distinctive voice on a song that needs exactly that is worth more than a bigger name that fits it badly.

What the fee actually covers

Most feature disputes are not about the number. They are about scope that nobody wrote down. Assume the fee covers writing and recording the verse, and that everything else is a separate ask:

Included by default	Ask separately
Writing the verse	Performing the song live
Recording it and sending clean WAVs	Appearing in the music video
One round of revisions, if you agree to it	Promoting it on your channels
Being credited	Exclusivity, meaning you will not do a similar record
	Extra verses, ad libs, or a hook

Two practical notes. Agree the revision count up front, or “can you try it a bit more relaxed” becomes a six-week loop. And send dry WAVs with no tuning or effects printed in, alongside whatever processed version you like. Vocals delivered with effects baked in and no dry pass are one of the delivery failures that recurs every week, and it makes you annoying to work with regardless of how good the verse was.

The two splits, and why one number cannot cover both

This is where most independent artists lose money, and it is genuinely simple once someone explains it.

Every song is two separate properties.

• The composition is the song itself: the melody, the lyrics, the underlying music. Split between the writers.
• The master is the specific recording. Owned by whoever the parties agree owns it.

They are split separately, and each side has to add up to 100 on its own. One percentage per person cannot express the ordinary deal, because you are frequently on one side and not the other. A featured artist who wrote their own verse holds composition. Whether they hold any of the master depends entirely on what you agreed.

On the composition, a featured verse is normally credited in proportion to what was actually written. One verse on a track with two other writers often lands near a third of the writing, adjusted up if you wrote the hook and down if you did not. This is a negotiation, not a formula, but “in proportion to what you wrote” is the principle everyone recognises.

Never take points

If someone offers you “three points on the master”, ask what they mean, because they have probably borrowed a phrase without the machinery behind it.

Points are a major-label convention. They are a percentage carved out of the artist’s royalty rate, and they are recoupable, which means the holder sees nothing until the label account recoups its costs. In an independent release there is no label royalty rate to carve from and no recoupment account to clear, so “three points” is a number with nothing underneath it.

Ask instead for a defined percentage of net master revenue after distribution, or take a flat fee. Both of those are things you can actually calculate and get paid on.

Credit is a term, not a courtesy

Get the credit exactly right in writing: the name as you spell it, where it appears in the title, and how it is entered in the distributor’s metadata.

A missing or wrong credit is the most common breach in independent music. It matters because the credit is your marketing, and your marketing is your next feature. Treat it as a term of the deal, and check the release page on day one rather than three months later.

Paperwork: one page, before release

A split sheet is one page. Legal names, what each person did, the composition percentages, the master percentages, the date, signatures. An email thread where both of you confirm the numbers is worse than a signed sheet and enormously better than nothing.

Do it early. The best moment is right after the first real exchange of audio, when your verse has met their track and both sides have leverage. Waiting until the record is finished means negotiating at the exact moment everyone’s estimate of their own contribution quietly goes up.

Two things go wrong without it, and neither is a lawsuit:

• Your royalties freeze. Publishing administrators and PROs cannot pay out a share nobody registered. The money sits.
• You lose syncs you never hear about. Music supervisors clear a placement in about 48 hours. A song whose rights cannot be explained in one email loses to a song whose can, and nobody sends you an email about it.

One jurisdictional trap worth knowing, because remote collaborations cross borders constantly. In the US, joint authors hold equal undivided shares by default and any one of them can license the work non-exclusively on their own. In the UK and most of Europe, licensing a jointly authored work generally needs unanimous consent. So a London topliner and an Atlanta producer with no paperwork are not in a relaxed situation. They are in a frozen one, where either party can block a deal by not answering an email.

This is general information about how the business works, not legal advice. On anything with real money attached, pay a music lawyer for an hour.

How to actually quote it

When the message comes in, answer with structure instead of a number:

Appreciate you sending it, the beat is in my lane.

Two ways I can do this:

1. Split deal. No fee, I write and record the verse, we go
   50/50 on my share of the writing for what I bring, and
   we sign a split sheet before release.

2. Fee. $[X] for the verse, work for hire, you keep the
   master, I keep my writing share on what I wrote.

Either way: one round of revisions, dry WAVs plus a
processed version, and credit as [exact name] in the
title and the metadata. Video and live are separate
conversations.

Which works better for you?

That message takes ninety seconds to write and prevents almost every argument this deal can produce.

Where the terms live

Full disclosure before this section: KollabMe is ours, so weigh it accordingly.

On KollabMe, a rate is a field rather than a message you have to go find again. You publish what you charge, per verse, per song, per session, and “open to free collabs” is a first-class choice on your profile, not an empty rate field, because for most of this market the split-only deal is the normal one.

When a collab request goes out it carries the terms with it, and the whole job stays in one thread: the reference, the voice memos, the rough, the dry WAVs, the number you agreed. That timestamped thread is the record of what was actually said, which is the thing you want six months later when memories diverge.

Then both of you confirm the collab is done. That handshake is the only thing that moves a KollabScore, which means the score reflects work that finished rather than work that was announced.

To be clear about one thing: KollabMe records the agreement, it does not administer it. No money moves through us, there is no escrow, and nothing on the platform clears or verifies a rights position. What you get is a clean record of what the two of you agreed and when. Sign a real split sheet.

Free on iOS, Android, and the web at app.kollabme.com.

FAQ

How much should I charge for a feature verse?

At the peer level, most independent features are no fee plus a writing split, and that is a normal deal rather than a favour. Once you have a measurable draw, local features commonly run in the low hundreds, and regional artists with real ticket sales command more. Price on what you bring to the record, not on follower count.

Should I take a fee or a split on a feature?

Take a fee when you need the money now, the record is not yours, and you do not expect it to travel. Take a split when you believe in the song and want upside. Many features are both: a modest fee plus a writing share. Decide which shape it is before anyone records, because it determines the paperwork.

What percentage of a song does a featured artist get?

There is no fixed number, but a featured verse is normally credited on the composition in proportion to what was written. A single verse out of a song with two other writers commonly lands somewhere near a third of the writing, adjusted for who wrote the hook. Composition and master are separate splits and each has to add to 100 on its own.

Should I ask for points on the master?

Not in an independent deal. Points are a major-label convention, carved out of the artist’s royalty rate and recoupable, meaning you see nothing until that account recoups. With no label royalty in the picture there is nothing to take points from. Ask for a percentage of net master revenue after distribution, or a flat fee.

Does a feature fee include the music video and promo?

Only if you say so. A fee normally covers writing and recording the verse. Shooting a video, performing the song live, appearing in promo, or granting exclusivity are all separate asks with separate value. Spell out what is included before you send the file.

When do we do the split sheet?

Before release, and ideally right after the first exchange of audio, when both sides have leverage and nobody is asking a favour. Waiting until the song is finished means negotiating at the exact moment everyone’s opinion of their own contribution goes up.

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