In a rare and genuinely generous move in today’s content-hungry, rights-controlled creative world, Moby has reopened and expanded mobygratis, his long-running free music licensing platform.
Announced on April 24 at NeueHouse Hollywood, the relaunch brings 500 new instrumental tracks, with 250 more arriving later this year and another 500 expected in 2026, all freely available for filmmakers, musicians, choreographers, students, and independent creators to use, remix, and experiment with.
The event, which featured a public conversation between Moby, Los Angeles Times pop critic Mikael Wood, and artist Vince Staples, marked a notable moment: not another tech platform looking to corner a market, but a globally known artist actively giving away his creative output, no strings attached.
Giving It Away, Again
“Free is a simple concept,” Moby told the audience. “mobygratis is just free. There are no strings, no structure to generate revenue, just music, made available for anyone who wants to create.”
The platform has been around since 2005, quietly supporting more than 50,000 independent media projects over the past two decades. But the new iteration signals a much larger ambition, with a vastly expanded catalogue, upgraded tools, and high-resolution multitrack files in WAV format that let users take the music apart and put it back together however they like.
“Free is a simple concept,” Moby told the audience. “mobygratis is just free. There are no strings, no structure to generate revenue, just music, made available for anyone who wants to create.”
Moby
That is a major shift from the old days of mobygratis, when creators could license finished tracks but had little capacity to customize. Now, musicians, DJs, sound artists, and editors can delve into the bones of the compositions, remixing and reshaping them for their own purposes. It is an upgrade designed not just for access, but for deep creative play.
Tapping the Archives
Moby says the pandemic lockdowns prompted him to look back through his archives, finishing off around 1,500 unreleased songs. “They’re all instrumentals,” he explained. “My hope is that people can find the music and do whatever they want with it; remix it, sing on it, use it for films, choreography, social posts, whatever.”
He adds that the project is meant to be “egalitarian chaos at its most open and unregulated,” a far cry from the rigid, monetized environment that dominates much of today’s creative landscape.
Importantly, mobygratis brings no direct commercial benefit to Moby himself. While his commercial catalogue has appeared in high-profile productions like Stranger Things, The Bourne Identity, and The Crown, the tracks offered here are strictly separate, created and shared for the sake of supporting creative freedom, not driving revenue.
Upgraded Tools, Broader Reach
The relaunch also addresses some long-standing user requests. The platform’s improved search function now allows users to filter by mood, style, and other characteristics, making it easier to navigate what is quickly becoming an enormous library. For independent filmmakers, YouTubers, student artists, and grassroots creators, that kind of streamlined access can make the difference between a stalled project and a finished one.
Moby has also built links to some of his favorite charities into the site, inviting users to “pay it forward” if they feel moved to, though there is no obligation or donation pressure attached.
In a time when access to creative tools and materials often comes bundled with fine print, subscriptions, or hidden costs, the blunt simplicity of mobygratis stands out.
Little Walnut and the Bigger Picture
Behind the scenes, the relaunch is powered by Little Walnut Productions, Moby’s full-service production company co-led with producer Lindsay Hicks. Known for developing projects across film, television, and podcasts (including the musician’s own Moby Pod), Little Walnut focuses heavily on work tied to advocacy, whether for animal rights, human rights, or environmental causes.
mobygratis fits squarely within this ethos, a low-profile but meaningful project designed to lower barriers and offer something tangible to the broader creative community.
“They’re all instrumentals,” he explained. “My hope is that people can find the music and do whatever they want with it; remix it, sing on it, use it for films, choreography, social posts, whatever.”
Moby
Why It Matters
In an industry increasingly dominated by platforms promising “creator empowerment” while taking cuts, demanding signups, or structuring access around advertising and data collection, mobygratis offers a different model. Make the material, put it out there, and let people use it however they want.
It is not charity, exactly, nor is it some utopian experiment in open-source culture. It feels more like an old-school gesture of support, scaled up for the digital age, one artist passing the baton to thousands of others and trusting them to run with it.
That kind of approach has always been relatively rare, but it is especially refreshing now, when even grassroots creators often face fees and licenses that can stall their work.
A Global Invitation
While the launch event was held in Los Angeles, the reach of mobygratis is global. Any creator, anywhere, can sign on and start using the tracks, whether they are cutting a student short film in Edinburgh, choreographing a dance piece in Nairobi, or editing a podcast in São Paulo.
Moby’s hope, as he put it on stage, is simple: “That people can find the music and do whatever they want with it.”
With hundreds of new tracks already live and more to come, it is a notable offering in a creative environment where the phrase “free resource” often comes with an asterisk. Here, there is no catch, just music handed over to the community, ready for whatever happens next.
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