There is currently no charge for registering songs with CCLI. Please contact us for further information.

CCLI is unable to recommend any particular publisher to you. The contact details for numerous music publishers, whom you may wish to contact directly, can be found on the Authorised List.

Under the current Copyright Law, a newly-written song is protected from the moment that it is written down or recorded in some physical or tangible format. Songs do not have to be registered in anyway to have copyright protection.

CCLI pays out royalties to registered song owners based on the copy activity reports from our licence holding churches and other organisations.

Our database includes over 200,000+ songs. Copyright holders are not deleted from our database, even if there is no copy activity reported.

To become a registered Copyright Owner with CCLI, you need to complete our Owner Agreement. Please contact our Intellectual Property Department at euip@ccli.com or +49 6202 85931-0

A Church Video Licence  is required to show authorised films/film scenes in any context within church.

CCLI advise caution when showing YouTube videos in church as YouTube’s terms state that it is for private use only without the written permission of the copyright owner and provided you are sure the video has been uploaded by the owner or a source authorised by them.

Many DVDs designed as small group material for churches include the right to show it in this context. Check the information printed on the resource or at the beginning of the DVD. If permission is not included, and your church has a Church Video licence (CVL) you can check if it’s covered using the CVL authorised producer list.
If you’re still not sure, you may need to contact the publisher to confirm the rights granted for use.

You should always ensure you have permission to use copyrighted material in church, regardless of the source.

The Church Video Licence grants permission to publicly display authorised content otherwise intended for private, personal use only. This means you can display any video which is covered by your licence provided you are showing it from an official channel or legally-obtained source.

The CCLI Church Copyright Licence and Streaming Plus Licence do not cover the visual element of a song video. Therefore, regardless of the source, we recommend you have direct permission from the owner before displaying a song or lyric video in church.

Provided your church holds a Church Video licence (CVL) you can show films authorised under the CVL in church activities using a legal streaming service.

The Church Video Licence does not permit churches to advertise the specific title to the general public. This would include a notice board outside of the church or fliers distributed to the general public.

We would advise you contact the producer directly if they are not included on our authorised list.

For the search of films, we recommend the IMDb website. This is one of the largest international databases for movies. Just enter the movie title you’re looking for.

Once you’ve found the movie, check out “Company Credits” and choose “See more”. Here you will find the categories “Production Companies” and “Distributors”. Here you can see filmstudios and / or rental for the respective country.

Sometimes the production company is not responsible for distribution in Germany, then please check with the “Distributors” under Germany (Germany), who is responsible for the rental.

Alternatively, you can use sales platforms, Search Amazon for the movie title. There, under “Details for this title” also the studio or the rental is displayed. In case of doubt, please contact the German sales office.

A list of individual titles covered by the Church Video licence does not exist. Instead, we encourage you to check for movie coverage based on our Authorised List of producers/distributors.

In the case of public broadcast, a GEMA fee is due, as e.g. the official World Cup song etc. is played or even the comments of the reporters make a game exciting.

You can cover the entire World Cup from 14.06.-15.07.2018 with a special tariff of the GEMA, if it concerns a reproduction without event character. “Event character” means that you advertise publicly for broadcasting in the town hall. According to unofficial information from the GEMA, an announcement in the context of a church service is deemed an “event notice” and not public advertising. However, if you also want to address people outside your church, select the tariff “Play single games in the context of events without further program”.

Here you will find the GEMA rates.

Yes. The CCL covers the congregation rather than the building. It therefore covers all church-related activities.

A licence would not be required unless the words/music for copyrighted songs were being projected, reproduced or copied.

The licence size category is determined by the regular attendance of your main weekly worship service. If you offer more than one main service to accommodate your entyre congregation, the category size would equal the total attendance of these services combined. If your church has more than one campus/location, however, CCLI offers a Multi-Site licence. For more information, go to Copyright Licence, or call +49 6202 85931-0

To search the lists of the songs, catalogues, publications, publishers and producers/studios covered by CCLI’s licences, visit our Authorised lists page.

Yes, your Church Copyright Licence covers your congregation rather than your venue.

Public Domain songs are songs that are no longer protected by copyright law. As such, you do not need permission to copy, reproduce or adapt them. No CCLI reporting is required for PD songs.

Copyright protection lasts for 70 years following the death of the last surviving author/writer, after which the song becomes PD.

Copyright law protects the owner from any unauthorised changes to their work. Therefore, you would need to contact the copyright owner and obtain their permission before making any changes to their song.

A house group would require a licence if they are reproducing song words and/or music for leading worship

‘All rights reserved’ simply indicates that a song is under copyright and you cannot reproduce or change it without the appropriate permissions. The Church Copyright Licence (CCL) permits you to reproduce authorised songs even if the copyright line reads ‘all rights reserved’.

The copyright year would usually be printed at the bottom or top of the authorised sheet music.

Authorized translations of foreign-language songs are covered by CCLI. However, a new translation always requires the consent of the author or copyright holder/publisher. If no authorized translation of the original is available, please contact the author or publisher and ask for an authorized translation or have your translation authorized. Until then, you may not use your own translations – not even in your own worship service, as this is a public event – nor may you pass them on or publish them under any circumstances.

Of course, you can use shared data sharing programs to help your musicians prepare. You need a valid CCLI licence and it should be ensured that the use of the provided notes is only used internally by your well-known musicians and for preparation.

Unfortunately there are many websites illegally offering lyric and music downloads, so we would recommend caution before using them. If you are downloading from an authorised company these can be reported in the usual manner. You may be interested in the CCLI SongSelect® subscription service, which enables churches to download lyrics and transposable chord sheets, lead sheets and vocal sheets.

You should always ensure you have permission to use copyrighted material in church, regardless of the source.

The Church Video Licence grants permission to publicly display authorised content otherwise intended for private, personal use only. This means you can display any video which is covered by your licence provided you are showing it from an official channel or legally-obtained source.

The CCLI Church Copyright Licence and Streaming Plus Licence do not cover the visual element of a song video. Therefore, regardless of the source, we recommend you have direct permission from the owner before displaying a song or lyric video in church.

Provided your church holds a Church Video licence (CVL) you can show films authorised under the CVL in church activities using a legal streaming service.

If the audio/video clip is in copyright then permission to publish it on a website will be required.

Yes. Whoever sets up your Reporting account will become the Account Administrator (you can reassign this to someone else later). The administrator can then send an ‘invite’ to anyone within your church to join your account. They will then be able to access your account and share the responsibility for reporting.

Yes, the Reporting search should still find your song. However, when a song is registered with CCLI it is most commonly done under the song’s official title which is often different to the first line. This occasionally causes confusion for the reporter. For example, Stuart Townend’s The Lord’s My Shepherd is actually called Psalm 23. Some have asked why the Reporting site won’t let you search by first line. It does, but sometimes the search result won’t match your search criteria because you searched by first line and the result is the song’s title. A good example of this would be a search for Graham Kendrick’s From Heaven You Came Helpless Babe which will return The Servant King as the first (and correct) result.

Of course, you can use shared data sharing programs to help your musicians prepare. You need a valid CCLI licence and it should be ensured that the use of the provided notes is only used internally by your well-known musicians and for preparation.

No. You need only report each time a song is reproduced.

You will be sent a verification email when you create your User Account with a link that you must click within 24 hours to complete the sign-up process. If you haven’t received this email it’s likely that it got caught in your junk mail philtre, so please cheque there first. Then, if you still haven’t received it, please contact Customer Support or call CCLI at +49 6202 85931-0

If a song is covered by CCLI’s licences, it is called authorised. There are a small number of popular and regularly sung songs which are not covered by CCLI and these are referred to as Unauthorised. The Reporting website features all songs authorised under the Church Copyright licence (CCL). If you can’t find the song you wish to report, please check carefully that you are entering the correct details. If you still can’t find it, it could mean a couple different things. The song information may not yet be submitted to CCLI by the publisher, or it may mean that you have reproduced an unauthorised song. In each case there is no need for you to report any activity. Please note, however, that permission to reproduce unauthorised songs must be obtained directly from the publisher.

Unfortunately, songwriters don’t always choose unique titles for their songs, and there can often be several versions/arrangements of the same song by different authors. This can cause some challenges when trying to report a specific song. The ‘POPULAR’ feature is there to help, showing the most common titles. If you find multiple results with that same song title, please check the names of the authors and copyright information to determine which song you need to report against.

TIP: If you click on the ‘i’ symbol next to a song title in the list of search results it will display further information about that song including the author, catalogue and copyright details, lyric preview and often a sound sample too.

You’ll find help-guides at ccli.com/reporting.

Only the Administrator can add or remove users and change who the Account Administrator is. If this person is no longer around, please contact Customer Support or call us at +49 6202 85931-0

Yes, you can amend your report at any time during your assigned reporting period. To make a change, click History, choose the song you wish to edit, click the arrow to the left of the song’s title, then the three dots to the right of the reporting categories.

We recommend that you report as you go. With Reporting you can assign as many users as you need to your account. This means that everyone who reproduces songs or makes copies can take responsibility for reporting. But if you find yourself in a situation where you have not reported weekly, yes, at the end of a reporting period you can still complete your reporting activities.

You can see how many times a song has been reported within the current reporting period. Click History, choose the song you wish to edit, then click the arrow to the left of the song’s title to see a list of previous reports of that song.

Yes, it’s still important to report. To do so, simply log in to the Reporting website and click Nothing to Report.

The number of copies permitted under the terms of the Church Copyright licence (CCL) is restricted to your category size registered with CCLI. For example, a category B/BB (50-99) size church can make up to 99 copies under their licence(s).

Yes. If you no longer have licence cover, you cease to exercise any right to use the copies and they should be destroyed.

Your Church Copyright licence (CCL) would the reproduction of authorised song words within an Order of Service. You should ensure that the correct copyright information is printed within the Order of Service. This can be found using SongSelect.

Public Domain songs are songs that are no longer protected by copyright law. As such, you do not need permission to copy, reproduce or adapt them. No CCLI reporting is required for PD songs.

Copyright protection lasts for 70 years following the death of the last surviving author/writer, after which the song becomes PD.

Under the words of each song reproduced you are required to include the following: “[author], © [year, owner], [your licence number]” e.g. Fred Smiley, © 2007 Happy Music Ltd., CCL No, 123456

You can obtain the current list on our website by going to SongSelect and open the authorised catalogues option to view the copyright owners/publishers.

CCLI cannot give permission to reproduce any material for which the copyright owner cannot be traced. If you reproduce these songs it is at your own discretion, and you must be prepared to pay royalties if the owner becomes known at a later date.

The Church Copyright licence (CCL) permits you to print authorised song/hymn words in a ‘home-made’ songbook for use in your services/assemblies. When you first create the book, you should report each song contained within it just once under PRINT. You don’t need to report the total number of songbooks you make, or any subsequent use of these same printed books again, regardless of how long you keep them. If you add additional songs, these should then be reported once under PRINT. However, if you subsequently print additional copies of your book, you should report again each song once under PRINT.

Copyright law protects the owner from any unauthorised changes to their work. Therefore, you would need to contact the copyright owner and obtain their permission before making any changes to their song.

A licence would not be required unless the words/music for copyrighted songs were being projected, reproduced or copied.

Each song should show the CCLI licence number and information about the author.
For example:
CCLI song number 6271093
David Hanheiser | David Reaper | Jonas Myrin | Matt Redman
© 2011 Atlas Mountain Songs (managed by SCM-Verlag GmbH & Co. KG)
Thankyou Music (managed by SCM-Verlag GmbH & Co. KG)
CCLI licence number 14

Your CCLI licence covers you to scan and project songs that are licensed by CCLI which are featured in songbooks.

SongSelect is a subscription service available to churches which hold a Church Copyright Licence. When your church purchases a SongSelect subscription, we’ll send you an Email containing your church’s Access Code. Follow the instructions in the email to set up your account. The person who initially sets up the account becomes the Account Administrator (though you can change this later). Once you’ve set up your account, you’ll have the option to ‘invite’ members of your church worship/PA/projection team to join your account, who will then become Users.

As an individual, you can set up a free SongSelect account at any time. This free account will give you limited access to SongSelect, including full access to the resources of songs within the Public Domain. A free SongSelect account is a great way of trialling SongSelect before you purchase a church subscription.

If someone in your church already has a FREE (Public Domain only) SongSelect account, they can simply link their existing account to your church subscription using your church Access Code. They will then have access

It is illegal to download words and music from websites that are not authorised by the song’s copyright owner. As long as your church holds a current CCLI Copyright Licence, you can purchase SongSelect® and download songs legally.

Churches do not need to report they have downloaded lyrics or printed chord/lead sheets from SongSelect®, this is recorded automatically by SongSelect. Reporting for the CCLI Copyright Licence would be required If these copies are subsequently reproduced e.g. lyrics projected or lyrics/music photocopied.

Lyric downloads have no limit. SongSelect Advanced and Premium allow you to download/print sheet music for up to 200 distinct songs per year. Additional songs can be purchased in increments of 50 upon request. However upon renewal any downloads left over would be lost.

Yes. Please contact our Sales department or call us at +49 6202 85931-0 for more details.

Some software packages incorporate a feature which links to your SongSelect® account. Contact your supplier for more details or visit our list of official API partners.

Additional users can be added at SongSelect®, simply choose “Create Account.” Once you have created your account you will be able to “link to an organisation” which will require your church access code. This code can be obtained from any administrator of your SongSelect account. Alternatively once you have created your account an administrator can invite you to the account by using the tab “Link user to the Account.”

Yes. An existing CCLI Copyright Licence is required to purchase any version of SongSelect®.

A unique download would be one individual song. A church would have 200 downloads per licence period. If a song is printed off in a different key or if multiple copies are printed of the same song, this would still only count as one unique download.

Your church can have unlimited users on SongSelect® and they can access SongSelect from any web device. Each user will need to create their own personal account and log in details and then they will be able to link to the church account.