From 1 December 2026 any UAE venue that plays music commercially needs a license from one of two Ministry-permitted collecting societies. Restaurants and cafés start at AED 1,500 a year for up to 50 seats, hotels pay AED 50 to AED 150 per room capped at AED 25,000, and shopping mall common areas are capped at AED 50,000. Playing without permission is already a criminal offense under Article 39 of Federal Decree-Law No. 38 of 2021, carrying at least two months’ imprisonment and a fine of AED 10,000 to AED 100,000.
The tariff is new. The underlying obligation is not.
What changed in August 2026 is that the Ministry of Economy and Tourism published a Collective Management Guide for Music under Ministerial Resolution No. 136 of 2026, which finally puts a published price on a permission most venues have been using without asking for. This guide covers who has to pay, the fee bands by venue type, what the money is actually spent on, how to check that whoever invoices you is entitled to, and what happens if you ignore it. If you want the underlying copyright framework rather than the venue tariff, start with how UAE copyright law works in practice.
Who Actually Needs a Music License
Any business that plays recorded or live music where the public can hear it needs permission from the rights holders. Article 1 of Federal Decree-Law No. 38 of 2021 defines “Public Performance” as communicating a work to the public by any means, expressly including “playing musical Works” and expressly covering communication that is “whether live or recorded.” A Spotify subscription, a radio in the dining room and a DJ on Friday night all fall inside the same definition.
That definition is the whole reason a license exists. A personal streaming account gives you a personal listening right, not a right to broadcast into a commercial space.
The Ministry’s guide names restaurants, cafés, hotels, floating hotels, shopping malls, retail shops, fitness centers, airlines, radio stations, television channels, and concerts and similar events. Anything in that list that plays music and charges customers is in scope.
Who Is Exempt
Four categories sit outside the framework: educational and academic institutions, government entities, national occasions, and personal celebrations of a non-commercial nature. The Ministry retains the power to add further exempt categories later.
The exemption is drawn on purpose, not on venue type. A private wedding in a hotel ballroom is a personal celebration, while the same ballroom hosting a ticketed event is not.
The Fee Bands by Venue Type
The tariff is built on capacity rather than turnover for most categories, which means a small operator’s exposure is genuinely small. The figures below are the published bands as reported when the guide was launched in August 2026.
| Venue type | Band | Annual fee |
|---|---|---|
| Restaurant or café, background music | Up to 50 seats | AED 1,500 |
| Restaurant or café, background music | 51 to 100 seats | AED 2,700 |
| Restaurant or café, background music | 101 to 200 seats | AED 4,800 |
| Restaurant or café, background music | Above 200 seats | AED 20 per seat, capped at AED 6,000 |
| Restaurant or café with DJ or entertainment | Up to 50 seats | AED 2,500 |
| Restaurant or café with DJ or entertainment | 51 to 100 seats | AED 3,500 |
| Restaurant or café with DJ or entertainment | 101 to 200 seats | AED 6,500 |
| Restaurant or café with DJ or entertainment | Above 200 seats | AED 20 per seat, capped at AED 8,000 |
| Retail shop or commercial complex | Up to 300 sq m | AED 1,700 |
| Retail shop or commercial complex | 301 to 700 sq m | AED 3,400 |
| Retail shop or commercial complex | Above 700 sq m | AED 60 per 25 sq m, capped at AED 20,000 |
| Shopping mall common areas | First 100 sq m | AED 625 |
| Shopping mall common areas | Each additional 25 sq m | AED 50, capped at AED 50,000 |
| Fitness center | Up to 300 sq m | AED 1,700 |
| Fitness center | Above 300 sq m | AED 5 per sq m, capped at AED 6,000 |
| Hotel | One and two star | AED 50 per room, capped at AED 25,000 |
| Hotel | Four and five star | AED 150 per room, capped at AED 25,000 |
| Airline | By size of operation | AED 5,000 to AED 45,000 |
| Radio station | General programming | 1% of annual income, minimum AED 1,700 |
| Radio station | Music-focused | 3% of annual income, minimum AED 1,700 |
| Television channel | General programming | 1% of annual income, minimum AED 1,700 |
| Television channel | News | 0.25% of annual income, minimum AED 1,700 |
The Two Bands Worth Modeling Before You Sign
Two bands behave oddly and are worth checking against your own floor plan. A restaurant above 200 seats pays AED 20 per seat but hits its cap at AED 6,000, which is reached at 300 seats, so a 500-seat venue and a 300-seat venue pay identically.
The DJ band is the one that costs real money. Adding entertainment to a 101 to 200 seat restaurant moves the fee from AED 4,800 to AED 6,500, a 35% increase for the same room.
What Is Not Published
The fee schedule reproduced above comes from the Ministry’s launch communications as carried by UAE press in August 2026. The full text of Ministerial Resolution No. 136 of 2026 was not retrievable from the Ministry’s own legislation portal at the time of writing, and neither society had published a downloadable tariff sheet.
Treat the bands as the published position rather than as a schedule you have read yourself, and ask for the tariff in writing before you pay. If your venue sits near a band boundary, that written confirmation is worth more than the difference.
Who Collects the Money, and How to Check They Are Real
Two organizations are permitted to collect: the Emirates Music Rights Association and Music Nation. Under Article 34(1) of Federal Decree-Law No. 38 of 2021, an association may only practice copyright management “after obtaining a permit from the Ministry,” and Article 15(6) of Cabinet Resolution No. 47 of 2022 requires that permit to be renewed annually against a fee. Anyone invoicing you who cannot evidence a current Ministry permit has no standing to collect.
That check matters more than it sounds. A new mandatory annual fee announced in the press is exactly the shape of demand that attracts imitators.
The relationship is also a private one, not an administrative one. Article 32 states that contracts concluded by these associations “shall constitute civil contracts,” so a dispute with a society is a civil matter between you and it rather than an appeal against a government decision.
They Cannot Refuse You, and They Cannot Play Favorites
Article 33 bars a society from making “no preference among applicants seeking to enter into contracts with them,” and it permits a lower fee in only two situations, each of which requires a reasoned decision. The first is use of works in public celebrations through live performance by performers, and the second is use in educational or cultural activities “that do not generate direct or indirect returns.”
Article 15(8) of the Executive Regulations runs the same rule in the other direction: a society “may not refuse to manage financial rights of Authors or Holders of Neighboring Rights without a justifiable reason.” Between them these provisions mean a society cannot quietly discount for a large chain and load the price onto a single café.
Where Your Fee Goes
Two published deductions come off the top before any songwriter is paid. Article 15(10) of the Executive Regulations caps a society’s administrative deduction at 25% of total amounts collected, allows it only for administrative expenses, and gives the Ministry power to reduce that percentage.
On top of that, 10% of total collections goes to a new Cultural Support Fund for Music, managed jointly by the Ministry of Economy and Tourism and the Ministry of Culture, before royalties are distributed. Article 15(11) prohibits any further deduction beyond administrative expenses without the consent of associate members.
What Happens If You Do Not License
Unlicensed public performance is a criminal offense, not a billing dispute. Article 39(1)(a) sets imprisonment of not less than two months and/or a fine of not less than AED 10,000 and not more than AED 100,000 for infringing an author’s economic rights without written permission, and Article 39(2) raises that to not less than six months and AED 100,000 to AED 500,000 on a repeat offense.
The civil route runs faster than the criminal one. Under Article 35(3) a rights holder can ask a judge of summary proceedings, on a petition, to prove public performance of a work in public and to prevent the continuation of the current show “or prohibiting it in the future.”
That order can land before you have had a hearing. Article 35 does give you protection, because the applicant must file the substantive case within twenty days or the order becomes entirely ineffective, and Article 36 lets you file a grievance with the president of the issuing court within fifteen days.
Your First Recourse Is Not a Court
Before litigating a tariff you disagree with, use the mechanism the regulations already force each society to operate. Article 15(14) requires every collective management body’s working mechanism to include “a mechanism for settlement of internal disputes and complaints by independent persons experienced in such field.”
Above that sits the Ministry. Article 15(7) empowers it to revoke a society’s permit for failing to comply with the law, and Article 15(5)(g) gives the competent authority inspection rights over the society’s own records.
How to License Your Venue Before December
The framework starts collecting in December 2026, which leaves a short window to price it and put it in the budget. The sequence below is the practical one.
- Map every place music plays. Walk the site and list the dining room, the lobby, the gym, the spa, the retail floor, the ballroom, the hold music on your phone system and the playlist on your social channels. The tariff prices some of these separately, so an unlisted space becomes an unlicensed one.
- Fix your capacity number. Take the seat count or floor area from your trade license, civil defense approval or lease rather than an estimate, because that is the figure a society will use and the figure a band boundary turns on.
- Match each use to a tariff band. Decide honestly whether a space is background music or DJ and entertainment, since the two bands differ by thousands of dirhams and the distinction is observable by anyone walking in.
- Check your existing contracts first. A background-music supplier, a franchise agreement or a mall service charge may already include a public performance element, and paying twice is a real risk in the first year of a new scheme.
- Verify the society’s Ministry permit. Ask for evidence of a current permit under Article 34 before transferring anything, and get the tariff band applied to you confirmed in writing.
- Budget it as an annual renewal. The fee is annual and recurring, so it belongs alongside your trade license renewal and the rest of your annual compliance calendar rather than as a one-time cost.
What This Costs a Real Venue
A single 90-seat café playing background music pays AED 2,700 a year, or about AED 225 a month. That is small enough that the compliance risk is plainly the larger number.
A 180-seat restaurant that runs a DJ on weekends pays AED 6,500, and a four-star hotel with 200 rooms pays AED 25,000 because the per-room rate of AED 150 reaches the cap at 167 rooms. For a hotel group the cap is genuinely favorable, since a 400-room property pays the same AED 25,000 as a 167-room one.
A venue that also holds a food activity should read the fee alongside the rest of its recurring compliance, since the music license renews on the same annual rhythm as the food trading license requirements it already meets.
The category most likely to be caught out is retail. A 900 square meter store pays AED 60 for every 25 square meters, which works out at AED 2,160 before any cap applies, and stores inside a mall may find the mall separately licensed for common areas while each unit remains responsible for its own floor.
How This Sits Alongside Your Other Licenses
For a new venue still costing its first year, the fee belongs in the same line of the model as the rest of the cost layers of setting up in Dubai, because it recurs annually rather than falling away after launch.
A music license is a permission from rights holders, not a government trade permit, so it does not replace or attach to anything on your commercial license. It sits beside the activity approvals you already hold, in the same way a Dubai alcohol license does for a venue that serves alcohol.
It also does not change your activity listing. If your venue is adding live entertainment as a new line of business rather than just background music, that is a separate question about adding a business activity to your trade license with the economic department.
One open point deserves flagging. Neither the launch communications nor the two societies stated whether a single license covers both organizations’ repertoire or whether a venue needs an agreement with each, and that question decides whether the figures above are your total exposure or half of it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need a music license if I only play the radio in my cafe?
Yes. The statutory definition of public performance in Federal Decree-Law No. 38 of 2021 covers communicating a work to the public by any means, “whether live or recorded,” which includes a radio playing in a commercial space. A broadcaster’s own license covers its transmission, not your re-communication of it to customers.
Does my Spotify or Apple Music subscription cover my business?
No. A consumer streaming subscription grants a personal listening right under its own terms and does not carry a public performance right for a commercial venue. This is the single most common misunderstanding among small operators, and it is not resolved by upgrading to a family or premium plan.
How much does a UAE music license cost for a small restaurant?
AED 1,500 a year for a venue with up to 50 seats playing background music, rising to AED 2,700 for 51 to 100 seats and AED 4,800 for 101 to 200 seats. Adding a DJ or entertainment moves the same venue to AED 2,500, AED 3,500 and AED 6,500 respectively.
When do the UAE music licensing fees start?
Collection begins from the start of December 2026 under Ministerial Resolution No. 136 of 2026. The underlying legal obligation to obtain permission from rights holders predates the tariff and has applied since Federal Decree-Law No. 38 of 2021 came into force.
Who collects music license fees in the UAE?
Two Ministry-permitted bodies, the Emirates Music Rights Association and Music Nation. Article 34(1) of the copyright decree-law makes a Ministry permit a precondition for practicing collective management at all, and Cabinet Resolution No. 47 of 2022 requires it to be renewed annually, so a current permit is the first thing to verify.
What is the penalty for playing music without a license in the UAE?
Article 39 sets imprisonment of at least two months and/or a fine of AED 10,000 to AED 100,000 for infringing an author’s economic rights without written permission, rising to at least six months and AED 100,000 to AED 500,000 on repeat. A rights holder can also obtain a summary order under Article 35 prohibiting the performance.
Are hotels charged per room or per venue?
Per room, banded by star rating, at AED 50 per room for one and two star properties and AED 150 per room for four and five star properties, subject to an annual maximum of AED 25,000. Because of the cap, the effective rate falls sharply above roughly 167 rooms at the four and five star rate.
Who is exempt from the UAE music license fee?
Educational and academic institutions, government entities, national occasions, and personal celebrations of a non-commercial nature. The Ministry can add further exempt categories, and Article 33 of the decree-law separately allows a reduced fee, on a reasoned decision, for live performance at public celebrations and for educational or cultural activity generating no direct or indirect return.
Can a collecting society charge one venue more than another?
Not arbitrarily. Article 33 prohibits preference among applicants seeking utilization contracts, and Article 15(8) of the Executive Regulations bars a society from refusing to manage rights without justifiable reason. The only permitted departures from equal treatment are the two reduced-fee grounds, each requiring a reasoned decision.
How much of my fee reaches the artists?
Less than the headline figure. A society may deduct up to 25% of total collections for administrative expenses under Article 15(10) of Cabinet Resolution No. 47 of 2022, and a further 10% of total collections is directed to the Cultural Support Fund for Music before royalties are distributed to rights holders.
Official Sources
- UAE Legislation Portal, Federal Decree-Law No. 38 of 2021 on Copyright and Neighboring Rights
- UAE Legislation Portal, Cabinet Resolution No. 47 of 2022 issuing the Executive Regulations of the Copyright Decree-Law
- Ministry of Economy and Tourism, legislation and ministerial resolutions
- Ministry of Economy and Tourism, intellectual property services
Information current as of August 2026. The fee bands are the Ministry’s published position as reported at launch. Verify the applicable tariff in writing with a Ministry-permitted collective management organization before paying.
This guide is for informational purposes only. UAE regulations and fees are subject to change. Always verify current requirements with the relevant official authority before proceeding with any application or transaction.
