UMG & WMG Are Reshaping Udio for 2026. Just One Question: Will Udio Still Exist In 2026?

For those heralding the birth of a well-regulated, walled-garden Udio in 2026, a sticky question of survival emerges.

On paper, it makes perfect sense. Wrap the proper licenses around AI-generated music, and voila: we have the birthplace of a flourishing music-creation ecosystem that credits and pays creators.

“We’re approaching this new era with one priority above all else: protecting and empowering the artists and songwriters who are our reason for being,” WMG chief Robert Kyncl intoned in a message late Wednesday. “This is the moment to shape the business models, set the guardrails, and pioneer the future for the benefit of our artists and songwriters.”

Kyncl is 100% right — ethically, financially, and legally. But that doesn’t mean that Udio 2.0 will work.

Will AI-loving creators, who have already damned Udio’s about-face, stick around for a heavily restricted reincarnation in 2026?

Suddenly, that’s a gnawing question for the music industry, even as it applauds the licensed dealmaking.

Already, we’ve witnessed a mutiny on Udio’s deck, one that forced the platform’s CEO, Andrew Sanchez, to quickly reopen downloads for a 48-hour period. Udio creators, accustomed to cooking up concoctions without limitations, have been crying foul ever since.

Now, they’re being asked to operate within a completely siloed walled garden, one that disallows downloads and limits inputs to pre-approved, licensed sources.

Will that fly?

From the perspective of existing Udio concocters, that’s like forcing Dr. Dre to downgrade from a 96-channel mixing board to a Fisher-Price DJ toy. It almost begs the question: is the idea to build Udio up, or bury it?

Cue up the smallest AI-generated violin for these free-for-all producers. After all, their ‘masterpieces’ were plucked from human-created — and often copyrighted — works spanning centuries. But more than a few industry folk are projecting that Udio is already toast, particularly given its heavy restrictions.

Meanwhile, WMG’s groundbreaking deal with Udio is almost being overshadowed by news from rival platform Suno.

First, there’s the $250 million Series C funding round, one of the largest of the year according to DMN Pro, which puts the platform at a $2.45 billion valuation. But there’s also the curious case of ‘I Run,’ an explosively viral dance track from the previously unknown ‘HAVEN.’ The track was quickly removed from Spotify, YouTube, and Apple Music, and disqualified by the UK’s Official Chart Company and Billboard.

After going searingly viral on TikTok, this is quickly becoming a confusing cloud of dispute. The allegation is that the producers behind HAVEN AI-regurgitated Jorja Smith’s voice to make the track. The producer set, led by Harrison Walker, has clapped back, claiming the track is actually Kaitlin Aragon’s voice — hey, you be the judge.

(It’s also worth noting that this — like all of the AI tracks charting to this point — is the work of savvy humans deploying AI, not pure generative AI sans humans.)

But removed or not, ‘I Run’ is already one of the most successful AI-generated tracks to date, and one of the few to chart. And it still exists on TikTok, with YouTube Music also carrying the re-uploaded version, crediting Kaitlin Aragon.

And the source of all this insanity? You guessed it — Suno, which definitely allows downloads and doesn’t have a ‘wall’ on its ‘garden’.

The rough reality is that TikTokers couldn’t care less whether the track was AI-generated or the real Jorja Smith—and that’s the scary part. Also scary: the track itself is pretty damn catchy, with Suno positively glowing after the viral blowup. Up in Silicon Valley, this is the ‘disruption’ investors and entrepreneurs dream about.

In that light, Suno doesn’t quite care about Robert Kyncl’s manifesto. And given Suno’s formidable war chest and serious market traction, will they agree so easily to a walled-garden settlement?

That’s not to undercut UMG’s (and WMG’s) important Udio agreements. But a walled garden, heavily-restricted reboot might be a death sentence — and a platform incapable of producing viral and chart-topping success stories.

Maybe the reformatted Udio model needs to open up a bit? The more participating licensors and experimentation, the better.