How to distribute AI music: a pre-release checklist for Suno tracks

You picked an aggregator. You did not pick what's inside the WAV you upload. That's the part most release-prep articles skip. If you want to distribute AI music to Spotify, Apple Music, Bandcamp, or SoundCloud, the submission form is the easy step; the audible "AI sound" survives the upload, the transcode, and the listener's earbuds. Distribution prep is more than a file-format conversion, and the old advice of "just convert your mp3 to a WAV" misses the actual problem.

This guide walks through what actually happens between a Suno generation and a release-ready submission: where the AI artifacts come from, which step fixes which problem, and what The Refiner handles at each stage. Four steps, in order: refine the fidelity, master (in-app or in a DAW), confirm format requirements, handle AI disclosure.

Why a Suno WAV isn't automatically release-ready

Suno offers WAV downloads to Pro and Premier subscribers on its web app; mobile downloads default to MP3. Its download-format guide does not establish different sample rates or bit depths for those two plans. Inspect the file you actually download. WAV preserves the sound it contains; changing the format does not repair the source.

AI music generators work in roughly this order: a transformer language model emits discrete audio tokens, and a neural codec decoder — a stack of transposed-convolution upsampling layers — turns those tokens back into 48 kHz PCM. That decoder stage leaves a structural fingerprint in the spectrum. A 2025 Deezer paper titled "A Fourier Explanation of AI-music Artifacts" showed that transposed-convolution upsampling architecturally periodizes the spectrum, producing model-specific patterns that listeners hear as narrow stereo image, slightly-too-tight transients, high-frequency shimmer or smear, and vocoder warble on sustained vocals.

Because those artifacts are in the PCM, a lossless WAV preserves them losslessly. An MP3 layers psychoacoustic loss on top but doesn't remove the underlying decoder peaks. So the Pro/Premier WAV download is a better starting point than the free-tier MP3, but neither one is a finished release. The decoder fingerprint travels with the audio either way. We unpack where those artifacts come from in why Suno tracks sound compressed.

Step 1: refine the fidelity

Refinement is where the audio itself is rebuilt. Loudness mastering, format conversion and AI disclosure happen further downstream. Drop the Suno file (WAV or MP3) into The Refiner and pick Enhanced. Enhanced is the shortest processing path and the recommended default; end-to-end time varies with track length, queue demand, and worker startup. Flow Matching is temporarily unavailable while output quality is reviewed. Its iterative approach can produce a different result, but it is not a deeper or more release-ready tier.

Enhanced exports WAV at 44.1 kHz and 24-bit by default. Pro and Studio unlock 48 kHz. The Flow Matching-only 32-bit float option is paused with that preset. The refined WAV is what you carry into step 2 — not the raw Suno download, even if your tier gave you a WAV. The container is the same; the contents are not.

Step 2: master — in-app or in a DAW

Mastering handles loudness, peak control and final tonal balance. Enable Finalize with Enhanced on Hobby, Pro, Studio or an active welcome trial for 1 additional credit, or choose standalone Finalize for an already-mixed track (1 credit). Choose optional Analogue Colour, then use final listening to compare with the original and set your reference, loudness, strength, Glue Compressor, Resonance Mix, Stereo Air and Stereo Width.

The initial preview does not automatically create a download. Use Render & download to keep a chosen version, then confirm your final export. You have up to three distinct mastered versions, with free repeat downloads and no additional credits. Check the measured loudness; a requested target may not be reached. See the final-listening instructions for returning to the session and keeping your main result.

Playback normalization changes listening level, while mastering also changes the sound's dynamics and tone. Compare candidate masters at similar listening levels instead of choosing whichever is loudest. Review the measured output and listen for flattened drums, harshness or pumping before you commit to a version.

Check the platform's current delivery guidance. The mastering walkthrough links Spotify's recommendations and explains how they relate to The Refiner's loudness choices.

Step 3: confirm format requirements

Most major aggregators — DistroKid, TuneCore, CD Baby, AWAL, Amuse — accept WAV. The common spec is 16-bit / 44.1 kHz minimum, with 24-bit at 44.1 or 48 kHz preferred. Some accept FLAC or AIFF as well; none of the major paid distributors want a lossy MP3 as a release master. Specs shift, so check your distributor's current documentation before you submit rather than relying on a one-line summary from anyone, including us.

The Refiner's default 24-bit / 44.1 kHz WAV lands inside that preferred range and matches what most aggregators recommend. If a distributor's documentation specifically asks for 48 kHz (some video-adjacent or sync-focused tiers do), Pro and Studio plans render at 48 kHz. Stereo only — surround and Atmos releases have separate workflows that are outside the scope of this guide. If you're delivering to a platform with a specific bit-depth or sample-rate requirement that doesn't match your DAW session, do the sample-rate conversion once at the end of your chain, not in the middle of it.

Step 4: handle AI disclosure

Major platforms have introduced — or are in the process of rolling out — AI-music disclosure flags and metadata fields. The exact labels and rules differ between distributors and stores, and they are still evolving. We're not going to quote specific store policies that will be out of date by the time you read this, and we're not giving legal advice.

The honest default: check your distributor's current AI-music disclosure policy before submission, flag the track as AI-generated or AI-assisted where the form asks, and keep your own records of which tools were used at which step — the generator, the refinement preset, the mastering chain, any stems work. That position ages well across policy changes and store-side audits, and it's also cheaper than having a release pulled after the fact.

Refining and mastering can also change AI-content detector scores, sometimes much lower, and no result is guaranteed in either direction. A lower score doesn't change how the track was made, so disclose the track as you would the unprocessed one.

Beyond disclosure, every distributor asks for the same basic metadata: track title, artist name, ISRC (your aggregator can mint one for you), release date, genre, language of the lyrics, explicit flag, cover art at the resolution they specify, and writer or publisher credits where applicable. Have those ready before you start the submission flow so the file you uploaded earlier in the session doesn't time out.

A note on Udio

If your source is Udio rather than Suno, the upstream of this workflow has shifted recently. Downloads were disabled across Udio in late October 2025 as part of an industry settlement, and a new partner-built platform is planned for the first half of 2026 without raw audio downloads. The practical implication: a substantial Udio audience currently can't submit new material to a distributor without having downloaded the file before the change. The rest of this workflow still applies to anything you saved earlier.

Pre-submission checklist

Run this before you hit submit. It's the same list we'd use on our own track.

• Source has been refined with Enhanced.
• File format: WAV (or FLAC if your distributor prefers it), 24-bit, 44.1 or 48 kHz, stereo.
• Loudness has been handled — Finalize in-app, or a DAW / mastering tool of your choice. True peak around -1 dBTP. Integrated loudness in the right neighborhood for your target platforms.
• No clipping. Look at the file in a DAW, not just your ears.
• Metadata complete: title, artist, ISRC, release date, genre, language, explicit flag, cover art at the right resolution, writer credits.
• AI disclosure handled per your distributor's current policy. Records kept of which tools were used.
• Final master listened to end-to-end on at least two systems, one of them not headphones.

Where The Refiner fits

Distribution is multi-step, and we handle two of those steps: the fidelity step, where we rebuild the audio to reduce generator artifacts and add plausible detail, and the mastering step, where Finalize brings the track to release loudness with a safe true-peak ceiling. Metadata entry, AI disclosure, and the upload itself are yours — and if you want a human mastering engineer in the loop, the pre-master file is the clean starting point you hand over.

Free tier covers one Enhanced refinement a month. Flow Matching is temporarily unavailable, so use Enhanced for new release preparation. Plan details and credit packs are on the pricing page. The homepage at The Refiner has side-by-side audio so you can hear what refinement and Finalize do before you upload anything. Start free, refine the track, master it with Finalize, and it's ready for the submission steps above.