RateYourMusic
Ranked 3 of 3 music databases by recommenders
Music fans recommend it for discovering new music through its detailed ratings and genre data; critics object to aggressive blocking and moderation.
Music fans recommend it for discovering new music through its detailed ratings and genre data; critics object to aggressive blocking and moderation.
14 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 8
- criticize it
- 6
- approval share
- 57%
Recommended in 6 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: not recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: not recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 8 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, not met.
- 1.3 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, not met.
- Recommended in 6 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Good for discovering new music
“The best way to discover music nowadays is RateYourMusic.”
Comment from 15 Dec 2025 in “2002: Last.fm and Audioscrobbler Herald the Social Web” “has been invaluable for me in discovering loads of music”
Comment from 14 Jan 2026 in “AI Generated Music Barred from Bandcamp” “RateYourMusic’s recommendations are solid”
Comment from 27 May 2026 in “Last.fm is now independent” Detailed genre and rating data
“they assign rating weights to users depending on how their rating distribution looks like”
Comment from 26 Sep 2026 in “Letterboxd Is Up for Sale, and A24, Sony and the New York Times Are Bidding” “RYM genres would be extremely useful to have as a beets autotag plugin”
Comment from 10 Nov 2025 in “Beets: The music geek’s media organizer”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Aggressive blocking and moderation
“RYM, who absolutely suck due to their crazy aggressive blocking, self sabotage and unforgivable data poisoning”
Comment from 1 Oct 2026 in “RSS Feeds for Last.fm” “Between the worst kind of Reddit tier moderation, the extreme anti-scraping measure affecting humans”
Comment from 28 May 2026 in “Last.fm is now independent” Site changes made it worse
“before the site owners made them unusable or pointless”
Comment from 1 Oct 2026 in “RSS Feeds for Last.fm” “rateyourmusic.com is also dead to me now”
Comment from 30 Sep 2026 in “RSS Feeds for Last.fm” Limited comments and similar-music results
“you can't leave comments under specific tracks on RYM”
Comment from 27 May 2026 in “Last.fm is now independent” “Neither page helped me find "similar" music”
Comment from 14 Jan 2026 in “AI Generated Music Barred from Bandcamp”
Other music databases people recommend
The two most recommended other music databases, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| MusicBrainz | 24 | 4 | 86% | 9 | — | Approved |
| Discogs | 12 | 2 | 86% | 7 | — | Approved |
| RateYourMusicThis page | 8 | 6 | 57% | 6 | — | — |
What people said
15 of the 16 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“RYM, who absolutely suck due to their crazy aggressive blocking, self sabotage and unforgivable data poisoning”
“before the site owners made them unusable or pointless”
“rateyourmusic.com is also dead to me now”
“they assign rating weights to users depending on how their rating distribution looks like”
“Between the worst kind of Reddit tier moderation, the extreme anti-scraping measure affecting humans”
“RateYourMusic’s recommendations are solid”
“you can't leave comments under specific tracks on RYM”
“It's a gem, and I hope Sonemnic (?) doesn't drive it to the ground.”
“hilariously indulgent and arbitrary from my 2nd hand vantage”
“for good forums there's Karagarga, rateyourmusic”
“Neither page helped me find "similar" music”
“has been invaluable for me in discovering loads of music”
“makes certain assumptions about the consistency of applying genres and about the very concept of genre”
“The best way to discover music nowadays is RateYourMusic.”
“RYM genres would be extremely useful to have as a beets autotag plugin”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.