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For DistroKid artists

DistroKid gives you an
ISRC, not an ISWC

Your DistroKid dashboard shows an ISRC and a UPC, and no ISWC anywhere. That's normal. Paste your ISRC below and find the composition code behind your song, free.

By Christiaan Maks, Founder & DeveloperUpdated

Find your song's ISWC

Paste the ISRC from your DistroKid release (it looks like QZ-ABC-24-00001, dashes optional) and get the ISWC work code(s) behind the recording.

Free, no sign-up. Recording-to-work links are sourced from The MLC, and no aggregated source is complete: a missing result does not mean your song has no ISWC. Verify against your PRO or publisher before any filing or financial use. SonoVault is not affiliated with DistroKid, The MLC, or any collecting society.

Recording vs composition

Why DistroKid never shows you an ISWC

DistroKid distributes recordings. The identifiers it assigns, the ISRC per track and the UPC per release, both live on the recording side of the industry.

An ISWC belongs to the other side: it identifies the composition, the song as written, and it is allocated when the work is registered with a performing rights organization or collecting society. Unless you separately registered your song with a PRO or through a publishing administrator, that registration never happened, and there is no ISWC for anyone to show you. When it has happened, the code exists but lives with the society, not in your distributor dashboard. The finder on this page bridges the two sides: it starts from the recording code you have and returns the work code you don't.

Quick decoder: ISRC = one recording. UPC = one release. ISWC = one composition, shared by every cover, remix, and re-record of the song. The full side-by-side lives on the ISRC ⇄ ISWC converter page, and the ISWC lookup covers the codes in depth.

Step by step

Finding your ISWC in under a minute

  1. 1

    Grab the ISRC DistroKid gave you

    Open the release in your DistroKid dashboard and copy the ISRC from the track's details. Don't have it handy? Search your artist and title in the free ISRC lookup on this site and copy the code from there.

  2. 2

    Paste it into the finder above

    The tool resolves your recording and returns the ISWC work code(s) linked to it, with the registered work title.

  3. 3

    Verify before you file

    Treat the result as a fast reference, not a legal record. Before putting the code on a registration or royalty form, confirm it against your publisher, PRO, or the society's own database.

If nothing comes back

No ISWC found? Here's what that means

Usually one of two things. If you never registered the song with a PRO or a publishing administrator, no ISWC has been allocated yet, and the fix is to register the work: the code arrives as part of that process, and with it your share of composition royalties. You don't apply for the code itself.

If the work is registered, the link between your recording and its work may simply not have reached the aggregated data yet; new releases take a while to flow through. In that case your PRO's member portal or publisher can confirm the code directly, and the finder here will catch up as the data does.

FAQ

DistroKid and ISWC questions

No. DistroKid assigns identifiers for the recording side of a release: the ISRC for each track and the UPC for the release. An ISWC identifies the composition (the song as written, not as recorded) and is allocated on the publishing side, when the work is registered with a performing rights organization or collecting society. A distributor never mints one.
Start from the ISRC DistroKid assigned. Paste it into the finder on this page: it resolves your recording and shows the ISWC work code(s) linked to it in the data we hold. If you registered your work with a PRO (like ASCAP or BMI) or use a publishing administrator, the code the society allocated is what should come back.
Two common reasons. First, the work may not be registered anywhere yet: if you never signed up with a PRO or publishing administrator, no society has allocated an ISWC to your song at all. Second, the link between your recording and its work may not have reached the data we aggregate (sourced from The MLC); new releases in particular take time to appear. No result here does not prove no ISWC exists.
Register the work. Join a performing rights organization (ASCAP, BMI, or SESAC in the US; PRS in the UK; your local society elsewhere) or use a publishing administration service, and register your song as a work with your writer details. The ISWC is allocated as part of that registration; you don't apply for the code itself.
The ISRC identifies one recording (each track has its own). The UPC identifies the release as a product (the single, EP, or album). The ISWC identifies the composition behind a track, independent of who records it. DistroKid handles the first two; the ISWC only exists once the song is registered on the publishing side.
Yes, identically. No distributor assigns ISWCs, because no distributor registers your composition; they distribute recordings. Whatever service released your track, the route to the ISWC is the same: take the ISRC it assigned, look up the work behind it, and if nothing is registered yet, register the work with a PRO or publishing administrator.

Mapping recordings to works at scale?

The SonoVault API resolves ISRC to ISWC and back across 90M+ recordings: batch lookups, reverse search from a work to every recording of it, and cross-platform IDs, behind one API key.

ISWC lookup for developersView the API docs →