By Con Raso, Managing Director of Tuned Global
Music, wellness, and movement are deeply neurologically intertwined. Tempo influences pace, rhythm supports endurance, and familiar tracks can reduce perceived exertion. Beyond physiology, music creates shared moments. It sets the atmosphere, builds anticipation, and turns individual activity into collective experience.
Well-chosen music increases workout intensity and duration, improves customer retention, strengthens brand recognition, creates community and cultural relevance, and opens new partnership models. When delivered through properly licensed, data-informed systems, these outcomes become measurable and scalable.
For sports, wellness and fitness brands, this means music selection needs to align with brand values, customer experiences and emotional outcomes. Music also gives brands a way to stay culturally connected to their audience.
The question for operators is how to use music strategically and legally. This is especially important because the way brands approach music has changed significantly.
Innovation means more than just plugging in Spotify and working out.
Early adoption in wellness, fitness, and leisure needs to incorporate more than simply plugging in a Spotify playlist and hoping for the best. Today’s leading sports and fitness innovators are far more sophisticated, curating music experiences that are brand-led, data-informed, tailored to specific audiences and workouts and fully licensed for commercial use.
That’s what we set out to accomplish at Tuned Global. Essentially, we work behind the scenes with brands to manage licensing, catalogue access, analytics and distribution at scale, in order to guarantee a thoroughly executed strategy and implementation for brands and users alike.
Because fitness and wellness brands shouldn’t have to become experts in music themselves, and because navigating the landscape of legal compliance in commercial environments is tricky and complex, branded musical experiences are so much more than just a Spotify playlist away.
In the best use cases, the resulting experience should feel intentional, on-brand and deeply embedded in the experience.
+Read more: “4 Ways Yoga, Wellness Apps Create Opportunities For Musicians”
Who is getting it right?
At Tuned Global, we’ve helped a number of brands worldwide to embrace music innovation within their fitness, health, wellness and movement solutions. I wanted to share a few case studies of where I think the brands really got it right.
1) Lululemon Studio: At-Home Fitness and Health
When Lululemon acquired Mirror, it marked a shift towards fully connected, at-home fitness where content, coaching, and atmosphere converge. Music plays a key role in making those workouts feel immersive and motivating, especially without a physical studio or shared space. Instructors needed access to curated, commercially-licensed music delivered consistently across live and on-demand workouts, while remaining compliant with music rights regulations.
Our role was to provide Lululemon Studio with a branded playlisting app solution that developed a fully-licensed commercial catalogue of music, and allowed instructors the freedom and flexibility to design high-energy, brand-aligned sessions. The result was a seamless blend of movement, coaching and sound that makes digital workouts feel immersive and premium.
2) Psycle London: Performance Led Experiences
Boutique fitness studio Psycle London has built a loyal following by transforming workouts into performance-led experiences where music is central to the user experience. Each class is choreographed to sound, with instructors designing sessions that build emotional peaks and sustained intensity. As the company expanded its digital, on-demand offering, it needed a way to give 70+ instructors access to fully-licensed commercial music while protecting the business from risk.
We stepped in to deliver a playlisting solution which enabled Psycle’s instructors to search a cleared commercial catalogue by artist, genre, or BPM, preview full tracks, and build tailored playlists for classes ranging from high-intensity rides to strength and conditioning. Behind the scenes, the music is delivered through secure API infrastructure integrated into Psycle’s own platform, with automated reporting to rights holders and support across label and publishing negotiations.
By combining creative flexibility with licensing governance, Psycle were able to scale its music-led experience across studio and digital environments without compromising on brand integrity, compliance or operational control.
3) Steezy: Movement and Music
Steezy, one of the world’s leading online dance platforms, sits at the intersection of sport, movement, and music. For dancers, music is not just background sound; it intimately defines timing, style, and expression. As Steezy scaled internationally, music became both its greatest asset and its biggest operational challenge, due to territorial rights and varying risks.
Tuned Global provided the licensed music catalogue delivery infrastructure that enabled Steezy instructors to search a cleared catalogue, curate playlists tailored to specific classes, and prepare sessions using commercial tracks. The system ensured that music used across Steezy’s app and desktop platform was properly licensed and reported to rights holders, supporting global expansion without exposing the business or its creators to legal liability.
By combining instructor-friendly tooling with robust licensing governance, Steezy was able to continue growing its international dance community while keeping music at the center of the experience.
4) UFC Ultimate Sound: MMA Culture
UFC Ultimate Sound launched as a fan-centric music and media app that broadens the reach of MMA culture beyond the octagon. Fans could explore curated playlists, exclusive audio content and branded experiences tied to UFC events, athletes and community moments, all within a custom digital environment.
Tuned Global powered the licensed music and media infrastructure that enabled the app to deliver commercial music and audio content securely at scale. By managing catalogue access, rights clearance and usage reporting, the platform helped support a fully compliant music experience that aligned with UFC’s brand values and global audience expectations.
This allowed the app to combine dynamic music programming with engaging content, giving fans a deeper, immersive way to connect with the sport.
+Read more: “How We Built a Tour Identity for Fred again.. That Fans Made Their Own”
Engagement extends into the broader wellness ecosystem.
Peloton turned instructors into tastemakers, using music-led classes to build community and drive subscription growth. Nike has explored music-fuelled storytelling and athlete content across digital channels. Major sports clubs use tailored sound design and playlists to enhance stadium atmosphere and fan rituals.
In e-sports and gaming as well, music deepens immersion and extends session time, while in wellness and recovery, carefully curated soundscapes support mental health outcomes. For wellness, sports, fitness and leisure operators considering deeper music integration, a few principles stand out:
Treat music as a product feature. It should support the outcome you want, whether that is higher intensity, calm recovery, emotional connection or brand recognition. Get licensing right from day one. Using consumer streaming services in commercial environments exposes brands to legal and reputational risk. Give creators freedom while maintaining brand control. Instructors, coaches and athletes bring personality, so give them tools to curate music safely within brand guidelines. Use data to refine the experience. Track how music impacts engagement, completion rates and retention, because music is measurable
It’s all about thinking cross-platform. Your music strategy should work across physical venues, mobile apps, connected devices and on-demand content. Consistency builds trust.
Prediction: Music in wellness will become even more adaptive.
As AI, biofeedback and real-time analytics become more embedded in fitness technology, music will increasingly respond dynamically to heart rate, pace or emotional state. Early implementations in health and performance environments are already demonstrating how adaptive music can optimize outcomes.
And as wearable technology and connected fitness continue to evolve, music will play an increasingly central role in shaping personalized experiences. The infrastructure choices operators make now will determine how easily they can adopt these capabilities later. The most successful innovators understand that when music and movement align, something special happens. With the right technology and licensing expertise in place, that can scale.
Those who invest early in licensed, data-informed music systems will be best placed to innovate without risk.
+Read more: “Mental Health Resources for Musicians & Music Industry Professionals”
Tuned Global is the leading data-driven Cloud Music Platform that empowers businesses to integrate commercial music into their apps or launch complete streaming experiences using advanced APIs, real-time analytics, licensing solutions, music intelligence and customizable white-label apps.
