Cinemas, film festivals and screenings

Our cinema licence covers your music uses managed by APRA. Importantly for your cinema, our licence meets your Copyright Act obligations and ensures the songwriters and composers who create the music in movies are paid a fair rate for their work.

This licences allow you to:

• Play music at your cinema, multiplex or drive-in
• To screen movies (including movie previews, advertisements etc)
• To play background music in your cinema’s public areas from any source including movie previews, radio, TV, tablets, streaming services and CDs.
• Play music at your film festival or one-off movie screening (including movie previews, advertisements etc).

How much does it cost?

The licence fee is 0.4% + GST of gross box office receipts with a minimum of $64.03 + GST per six month period.

Twice per year cinemas are asked to report their gross box office receipts for the previous six month period - once in February and again in August. This information is then used to calculate the invoice for the previous six month period. The cinema licence is subject to a minimum fee.

Film Festivals pay the same rates as cinemas but the fee is charged after box office receipts are totaled.

Free screenings (e.g. movies in the park) are charged the minimum fee.

We can also help if you use music on hold for your cinema's telephone system.

Cinema Licence Application (pdf)