If your church puts its Sunday service on YouTube or Facebook, there is a good chance you are singing copyrighted songs to an audience outside your walls. That raises a question a lot of Phoenix Valley worship leaders only think about after the fact. Are we allowed to do this?
The short answer is yes, but you need the right license. The regular CCLI Church Copyright License that lets you print lyrics and project them on screen does not cover streaming. Streaming is a separate license, and a lot of churches assume the two are the same thing. They are not.
What a streaming license actually covers
A CCLI Streaming License lets you livestream and post recordings of your own church musicians performing copyrighted worship songs, free of charge to whoever is watching. That covers your worship band leading the congregation on a Sunday morning, and it covers the recording sitting on your YouTube channel afterward. The catalog is large. The license reaches more than 450,000 songs and hymns across CCLI's publisher list, which is most of what a modern worship set pulls from.
Pricing is based on your average attendance. A church of 100 to 199 people pays around $108 a year, and churches already licensed with CCLI can add streaming for as little as $84. For most congregations that is a small line item, and it buys peace of mind.
What it does not cover
Here is where churches get tripped up. The streaming license covers your own musicians playing live. It does not cover playing a Spotify track or an artist's recording during your stream. So if your team walks people in with a commercial recording of a popular worship song, or plays a music video on the screens while the camera is rolling, that is outside the license. Choir anthems are also not included, which surprises a lot of traditional churches. Anthems are usually licensed separately through the publisher or a service like OneLicense.
One more thing worth knowing. As of January 1, 2026, every hymn and musical work published before January 1, 1931 is in the public domain. So the older hymnal is largely free to sing and stream. It is the contemporary catalog that needs the license.
What about the songs in this Sunday's set?
Run your set list through a quick mental filter. A current worship song led live by your band is covered by your streaming license. A hymn written in the 1800s is public domain and free. A commercial track you play over the walk-in is not covered, and neither is a choir anthem. If your church leans traditional and the choir carries the service, look into OneLicense or a direct license from the publisher, since CCLI's streaming license stops at congregational singing. Most churches only need to make two or three small adjustments to be fully clear, and none of them change what the congregation actually experiences on Sunday.
How this connects to your AV setup
Licensing and gear are two halves of the same job. A clean, legal stream starts with a clean signal, which means your audio and video need to be solid before you ever hit the license question. If you are still getting your stream off the ground, our beginner's guide to live streaming your church service walks through the cameras, audio feed, and encoder you need. And if you are pushing to more than one platform, our post on streaming to YouTube and Facebook at the same time covers how to do it without buying two of everything.
A simple checklist for Phoenix churches
Start by confirming what you already have. Log into your CCLI account and check whether a Streaming License is listed, because a lot of churches carry the print license and nothing else. Report the songs you use, since CCLI's reporting is how songwriters get paid and how you stay covered. Keep your live music live, and skip commercial recordings on camera. If you run a choir, ask about a separate anthem license.
The rules are not there to make worship harder. They exist so the people who write the songs your congregation loves can keep writing them. A license that costs less than a month of coffee for the office is a fair trade for that.
If you want help making sure your stream is set up right from the audio feed to the final broadcast, reach out to the Brilliance AV team. We work with churches across the Phoenix Valley and can get your system dialed in so the only thing you have to think about on Sunday is the message.
About Brilliance AV
Brilliance AV is a church AVL design and installation company based in Tempe, Arizona, serving the Phoenix Valley. Call us at (480) 903-4432, email hello@brillianceav.com, or get in touch through our contact page.
