JASRAC Awards


The JASRAC Awards is a music awards established in 1982, presented by the Japanese Society for Rights of Authors, Composers and Publishers, which is given to songwriters, composers and music publishers who have generated the highest revenue in royalties during a fiscal year.

Overview

The JASRAC Awards is awarded to songwriters, composers and music publishers whose works have received the largest revenue in royalties by the JASRAC earned through music distribution, karaoke and media usage like features in advertisements. The top three songs out of the ten highest-grossing songs are awarded the Gold, Silver and Bronze Award while the International Award is given to the song with the highest revenue overseas and the Foreign Award is awarded to highest-earning non-Japanese song in Japan.
The winner of the Gold Prize for the fiscal year of 2024 was also awarded the Song of the Year for Creators at the 2025 Music Awards Japan which was presented by JASRAC.

Milestones

In 2003, the background music for 2001 animated film Spirited Away composed by Joe Hisaishi became the first instrumental work to receive the Gold Award. In 2012, JASRAC announced that SMAP's 2003 single "Sekai ni Hitotsu Dake no Hana" had generated the most royalties in the 30-year history of the awards.
As of 2025, five songs won Gold Award for two consecutive years:
In 2012, the Gold, Silver and Bronze Awards was awarded to "Heavy Rotation", "Ponytail to Shushu" and "Beginner", all by AKB48. It was the second time in the award's history since 1996, when composer Tetsuya Komuro won Gold, Silver and Bronze Awards, that all three main awards were awarded for songs performed by a single artist. According to Asahi Shimbun, the idol group placed a total of five songs in the top ten of the highest crossing works in royalties in 2011. The following year, songs by AKB48 once again took Gold, Silver and Bronze Awards with "Heavy Rotation" winning Gold in the second consecutive year, "Flying Get" for Silver and "Everyday, Katyusha" for Bronze.
In 2015, the Silver, the Bronze, the International and the Foreign Awards were given to works related to animation music. The background music of Attack on Titan and 1978's "Lupin III Theme" won Silver and Bronze respectively, while the Dragon Ball Z BGM won International Award and "Let It Go" from Frozen won Foreign Award. The Fairy Tail BGM won International Award in 2017 with 97.7% of the total royalties generated in France alone.

Winners

1980s

1990s

2000s

2010s

2020s