The Association of Independents in Radio (AIR) is proud to introduce the 2025 Rate Guide, a long-awaited essential resource designed to empower independent audio professionals with the latest, data-driven insights into fair pay. This comprehensive guide responds to a dramatically transformed media landscape, offering freelancers the tools to advocate for their worth, negotiate confidently, and build sustainable careers.

“Independent audio professionals have navigated rate negotiations with little transparency for years. This guide is more than a reference, it’s a tool for empowerment,” said Keisha Salmon, Executive Director of AIR. “Freelancers are the backbone of the audio industry, and they deserve clear, data-backed benchmarks to help them secure air pay and sustainable careers.”

The 2025 Rate Guide provides updated benchmarks for producers, sound designers, story editors, fact-checkers, and researchers in the audio industry. It also includes a newly expanded role and responsibilities reference tool, helping freelancers and hiring organizations better define experience levels and roles. The guide is based on a comprehensive research process conducted throughout 2024, including an industry-wide survey and in-depth interviews with freelancers and employers.

Why This Guide Matters Now More Than Ever

Since the last Rate Guide in 2021, the audio industry has undergone rapid shifts, including the explosion of podcasting, new funding models, and increasing demand for high-quality production. Yet, freelancers, the backbone of the industry, have often been left without clear standards for fair compensation. The 2025 Rate Guide fills this gap by providing:

Fresh data on industry pay featuring the latest freelance rates for producers, show runners, sound designers, fact-checkers, and researchers.

A reimagined reference tool for roles helping freelancers and hiring organizations align on experience levels and roles.

A reality check on rates based on survey data and interviews with freelancers and industry employers reveals what professionals are paid.

“The Rate Guide is a vital resource for freelancers trying to establish their rate and for organizations creating budgets. It is also AIR’s most visited resource,” said Erin McGregor, Program Manager at AIR, who leads the rate guide research. “The Rate Guide is intended to help freelancers understand how to think about and understand their rates.”

Breaking Down the Research

The 2025 Rate Guide was developed by AIR’s Rate Guide Committee, led by McGregor and AIR Board members Mia Lobel, Will Coley, and Rob Byers. The guide categorizes freelance rates into four key areas:

Producer Rates

Story Editing & Research Rates

Fact-Checking & Research Rates

Mixing, Engineering, Sound Design & Music Composition Rates.

The research behind the 2025 Rate Guide was extensive. In 2024, AIR conducted a two-phase process:

An industry-wide survey collecting direct rate data from freelancers across roles.

Deep-dive interview speaking with over 50 freelancers and hiring organizations to understand rate-setting practices and pay expectations.

More Than A Guide: A Movement For Fair Pay

 AIR is reinforcing the release of the 2025 Rate Guide with a series of hands-on-events, equipping freelancers with the tools they need to advocate for better pay:

Panel: Guide to Fair Pay In Audio: What Freelancers Need to Know (March 6th)

Panel: Setting Project-Based Rates (March 27th)

Workshop: How to Track Your Rates (April 17th)

The Association of Independents in Radio (AIR) is excited to announce its new partnership with Tape Syncers United (TSU), strengthening its commitment to fair compensation standards in the audio industry. The collaboration integrates TSU’s tape sync rate recommendations into AIR’s comprehensive rate guide, offering greater transparency and consistent pay standards for audio professionals.

“We are thrilled to adopt the Tape Syncers United Rate Guide as part of our industry resources,” said Erin McGregor, Program Manager at AIR, who is leading the rate guide work. “TSU’s grassroots approach and collective decision-making process provides a dynamic model that ensures rates remain relevant and equitable year after year. This partnership enhances our ability to support audio professionals with up-to-date compensation benchmarks.”

AIR’s Rate Guide has served as a trusted industry resource for producers, editors, sound designers, engineers, mixers, fact-checkers, and entrepreneurs. TSU’s collaborative rate-setting process ensures tape sync rates reflect current market conditions, supporting sustainability and equity.

TSU regularly hosts meetings where members collaborative determine suggested rates. In its most recent update in early 2024, TSU raised the suggested minimum rate for a basic tape sync from $200 to $235, which includes a $35 equipment fee. This annual review reflects TSU’s commitment to fair compensation through collective advocacy. For more details, access the TSU Tape Sync Rate Guide.

“TSU is a proud community of tape syncers and producers from all over the world working together to help ensure both equitable and sustainable rates,” said Cory Choy, steering committee, Tape Syncers United. “Partnering with AIR is a natural and symbiotic step for us, and we are looking forward to everything this collaboration brings.”

About the TSU Rate Guide

The TSU rate Guide was established by a grassroots coalition of audio producers and tape syncers, drawing members from AIR and various public radio, audio, and podcast communities, who recognized the need for more frequent and equitable rate updates in the industry. The guide represents a collective approach to rate-setting, with its global membership voting on changes at least annually.

All TSU members commit to maintaining these established minimum rates, ensuring consistent professional standards across the industry. Through this collective action, TSU has created a living document that responds to market conditions while protecting the sustainability of tape sync services.

About the Association of Independents in Radio (AIR)

AIR supports independent audio professionals through advocacy, resources, and community-building initiatives. With tools like the Rate Guide, AIR empowers creators to build satisfying careers in public and private audio sectors. To learn more, visit airmedia.org.

Podcasters often find that collaborating with other podcasters is beneficial. Many of us have created segments, or put together stories, for someone else’s podcast. Often, this work is done for free out of friendship or the love of podcasting. But, it doesn’t have to be done for free.

AIR has, for the first time, addressed payment rates for work that is done on podcasts. It has differences from the rates that might apply to freelance writing or graphic design work. This payment rate chart, that is specific to the nature of podcasting, is incredibly useful – especially as podcasting becomes more commercial.

AIR is an advocacy group that was founded in 1988 by 10 independent radio producers. Today, their network has expanded to about 1,000 independent audio producers, multimedia journalists, and public media programs, stations, and networks across 29 countries. AIR is headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts.

The pay scale is broken up into three levels: Novice, Intermediate, and Advanced. These levels refer to the expertise of the person creating the podcasting content. A Novice is going to make less than someone who is considered to have Advanced skills.

There are also three levels that describe the type of work being created. For example, Level 1 pieces are the lengthiest and most time-consuming to produce. Things that take less time might be a Level 2 or Level 3 piece. In other words, the effort that goes into creating content is recognized. The more effort it takes – the higher the pay rate.

Other parts of the pay rate chart set rates that podcasters can charge for pilot ideas, tape syncs, pilot production, the production of content from already gathered actualities, and even a day rate.

This is great news for people who produce content for other people’s podcasts, or who have been asked to produce or edit podcast content for another podcaster, a company, or by the boss of their “day job”. Use this chart as a starting point for the pay you should receive for the content that someone else wants you to create for them.

AIR suggests that producers charge for-profit outlets more than nonprofit entities. It also suggests that freelancers producing pieces for on-air broadcast negotiate at least a 5 percent rate increase if the piece you create is then redistributed as a podcast.

One of the great things about the pay scale that AIR has created is that it doesn’t differentiate between whether the person creating the content happens to be male or female. That means podcasting can become a field where women can expect equal pay for equal work.