Why Human Made Music Will Always Win Over AI-Generated Music

The share of daily uploads of human made music continues to decline, with no indication of reversing course. In Early 2026, around 60.000 AI generated music tracks get uploaded to Deezer each day.

We expect to reach a share of 50% AI generated daily uploads by the end of 2026 and that is a huge number of mass produced tracks passing successfully the review chain of worldwide streaming services.

Human- vs AI-created Music: How to hear the difference?

Shocking news for all the ones who think that AI is not up to generate fully authentic music. Studies show that 97% of listeners cannot distinguish fully AI-generated tracks from human-made ones.

You’ve probably heard of successful “AI artists” such as “The Velvet Sundown” that gained millions of streams in 2025 for its 70s-style psychedelic rock/folk music reaching millions of streams on Spotify, without someone noticing that it was fake.

So how can we distinguish AI generated tracks from human made ones?

Here are some things to pay attention to:

1. Too perfect vocals – The human voice is a key element of interesting and successful music. Over many years, we’ve become highly attuned to every detail of the human voice. AI singers sound flat, robotic, and overly perfect in pitch. They lack the important nuances that convey emotion. This makes AI-generated music often sound disturbingly uncanny to us.
2. No creative breakthroughs – AI follows a very “safe” approach when arranging the music. You won’t hear interesting characteristic sounds, no changes in rhythm which spice up the listening experience. You will always hear safe harmonic and melodic structures, as it will never risk sounding “inaccurate”.
3. Fails to deliver authentic messages: Every great human created song has a message and a purpose. AI creates music by mixing up a lot of unique songs to generate a derivative from that. When listening to AI created music, you will notice that the music and subtle details in sound and dynamics are not supporting that core message. It just sounds unauthentic.
4. Sound glitches and artifacts: If you’ve ever had AI generate an image for you and noticed weird, unreal or cut-off objects in the background, the same thing can happen with music generation. Strange sounds that don’t fit the music can appear and distract from the message.
5. Bland Lyrics: Quite frankly, AI isn’t great at writing purposeful lyrics either. If you pay attention to the actual words, you’ll hear repetitive and overused phrases that make the music sound cliché and boring. AI fills the space with words that appear most often in similar genres.

Why do humans make music?

This fascinating development music quality derived from AI opens a huge debate between musicians, labels, producers and artists worldwide. This goes so far that some music creators think their job becomes replaced by AI within the next five years.

…and this sounds unsettling.

We know know that the main difference of AI generated music and human made is and will always be authenticity. This is why human made music is a fundamentally different thing.

To be specific, it involves the movement of the performers while singing or playing an instrument, the expression of feelings and meaning in the words and the organic energy building up between people. That is music in a traditional sense.

It is not about the music as sound, it is about the feeling being conveyed.

In contrast, AI music is an attempt to generate sounds that simulate the experience of listening to real music — just like a video game with ultra realistic graphics is trying to mimic things in the real world.

Where to find non AI music?

We can say with almost 100% certainty, that AI will eventually sound so real that no one (not even experts and musicians themselves) can distinguish it from the sound of real music.

Streaming services get flooded with music (be it real of AI generated). Its a place where almost everyone can submit their sounds to.

A safe source of 100% human-made music are platforms with a heavily regulated output, strict quality control, and clear non-AI messaging, such as HookSounds.

We and our in-house artists and producers know the value of human created music. The manual effort they put into their creations is a way for them to express feelings authentically.

Take a listen to a few examples from our repertoire, played with real instruments and real emotions:

 

 

Why Human Made Music Will Become More Valuable in the Age of AI

We as humans naturally seek the path of least resistance. AI-generated music fits this perfectly — no need to brainstorm ideas, buy recording equipment, master arrangement skills. Agencies are adding AI generated music to their clients projects to save costs and artists do not need a producer to put their thoughts into music..

Given this trend, AI-generated music will likely become the go-to solution for quick results for a lot of people.

But is there a catch?

Think about the following real-world scenario for a second:

Imagine a wooden desk. What would you think would be perceived as “higher value” or at least “could be sold with a higher price”?

• A desk created in fully automated assembly lines, polished, neutral colors, perfectly cost-use optimized.
• A desk created by hand, including details, imperfections, character and being unique even beyond the surface.

We see that same difference in physical products now. And we believe this principle can be applied to digitally available music with the rise of AI.

But when AI becomes so good at creating “authentic sounding” music, no one will notice the difference anyway, right?

This is true. But as soon as you can proof that the music was handmade (for example through legally mandatory labels or insights into the production process), you, either as a company creating advertisements or as an artist, will be ahead of the masses. Your projects will have a much higher perceived value.

Is the amount of time someone spent on a music piece equal to its “perceived quality” then?

Clearly no.

What makes human created music so valuable are actually some of the following aspects:

#1 Rarity and Authenticity

Real artists bring nuance, cultural context, and genuine feeling to their work—elements that arise from personal experience, not data processing.

#2 Emotion can’t be automated

Music carries emotional weight that comes from a composer’s intuition, personal struggles, and artistic vision — qualities that no algorithm can replicate or authentically convey.

#3 Real Emotions are valued

By choosing human-made music, you help sustain artistic careers and ensure creators can continue doing what they love.

#4 Quality over Quantity

Human made music undergoes rigorous creative refinement and professional production standards. We believe that artistic excellence wins over mass-produced content.

In Summary: Why Choosing Human Created Music Matters

When you choose human-made music, you’re making a statement about what matters: authenticity, artistry, and the irreplaceable human touch.

This helps human made music to thrive in an increasingly automated world. AI just will and can not replace human music.

Humans need to feel valued. That is a natural law. A fully automated world sounds like a dream if you are trying to avoid effort and hurdles. But in the long run, it will make everything feels flat, boring and lifeless.

Artists and producers will stay motivated and positive about doing the things which they love to do; Listeners will continue to have access to music which actually moves them, not only by the music but also through their favorite artists stories – and this alone makes the world a better place, right?

We invite you to support that ambition together with us.

How you can support human artists with HookSounds

As a company in the music industry, we could easily fill our catalog with AI-generated music to close gaps. But we chose not to – for the reasons outlined in this article.

Our customers notice and value this commitment.

By choosing HookSounds, you support human artists, helping them earn a fair living from their craft. Every license or subscription directly funds the artists behind our music.