How much does a VTuber song cost? NIJISANJI’s Finana Ryugu explains

VTubers can be quite the musical bunch, with a massive community of musicians singing their hearts out and producing some amazing tunes. However there is a cost associated with all that ⁠— one NIJISANJI’s Finana Ryugu opened up, on using her experiences.

The VTubing community is full of talented musicians, lending their vocal cords and mixing prowess to make some great beats.

However all that work comes at a cost. Making a single song involves a lot of moving parts. The easy stuff is singing and adding instrumentals. But there’s also producing and mixing, to perfect the sound for release. If it’s recorded in-person, there’s studio costs. There’s also lyricists who can lend their songwriting craft, and if you want a music video, you’ll need animators and artists.

This cost can rack up quickly, so how much does a VTuber song cost? Well, NIJISANJI star Finana Ryugu shared as much on stream, and it can get into the thousands ⁠— no matter whether it’s a cover or an original work.

She opened up by explaining the process of creating a cover song, which isn’t straightforward if you’re an agency VTuber.

“I wanted to start off with an original song actually,” she explained. “I did want to do song covers but I was still sort of new to everything, so I felt like I needed to learn a little bit more about this kind of stuff and what I can do.

“The whole planning process of making a cover is not as simple as you think, especially if you’re associated with a corporate [agency]. You have to check permissions and stuff, you know, just to make sure you won’t get [copyright] striked down or whatever.”

Then she opened up on the cost, and all the separate parts involved: “Each cover is probably going to cost around $1000, [and] depending on how complex the music video is, and that may require more illustrations, it might go above.

“I think the last music commission I did was about $6000.”

Of course, this cost doesn’t apply to all VTuber musicians. Some do everything themselves ⁠— from the mixing to any vocal work, and even designing some visuals to go alongside it. However the more you have to outsource, the more you have to pay.

The complexities of each are different beasts to tackle too. While covers already exist, there’s still plenty of work to do to make it your own. It does pale in comparison, however, to original songs.

“Doing a cover song is a lot easier to do because sometimes you may or may not have some of the assets to know how to sing the song perfectly. You also are familiar, you get to pick a song you’re comfortable with.

“When you’re doing an original, you don’t know how it’s going to sound at the end, so you have to challenge yourself to really know how this is going to sound. Usually the composer would give you a demo.

“Tsunami was really good for me up until a couple of parts that were a little difficult because I never really sung songs that used those vocal techniques. I really had to try something different. I wanted to do the original song first because I really wanted to come off with a bang, and I got to work with one of my favorite creators [KIRA] that I’ve been a fan of for a very long time.”

If you’re planning on getting into music as a VTuber, it can be easy to start with some on-stream karaoke or acoustic clips on Twitter. But if you want fully-fledged productions, be prepared to splash the cash.