How to do karaoke with friends for free
There are five realistic ways to run karaoke with friends without paying for anything, and they suit genuinely different situations. This is an honest survey of what each one does well, including where our own app is the wrong choice.
Just using YouTube
Searching YouTube on a TV and playing karaoke videos one at a time is the most common approach, and it works. It is free, universal, needs no setup, and everybody already knows how to do it.
The limitation is social rather than technical. One person ends up holding the laptop, taking requests, and typing searches all night, which makes them the DJ instead of a guest. There is no shared queue, so nobody can see whose turn is next, and requests get lost or repeated. For a small group who mostly want background singing, none of that matters. For a proper karaoke night with eight people, it is the thing that eventually breaks.
Licensed karaoke apps
KaraFun, Singa and similar services license their own karaoke recordings. Every track is produced to the same standard, in a sensible key, with lyrics timed properly to the music, and you can usually adjust the key and tempo to suit whoever is singing.
They run on a subscription. Free tiers exist and give you a limited selection, but the full catalogue is paid. If track quality is what matters most to you - if the people singing actually sing - this is the category to pick, and the paid tier is worth it. More detail in our comparison with KaraFun.
Social singing apps
Smule and similar apps are built around recording performances and sharing them. You sing solo, in duets, or in group songs, and the result is something you keep and post to a community of other singers.
This is a different activity from a room of people singing together, and it is worth being clear about that before you download anything. If you want a recording of how you sounded, this category is the only one that does it. If you want a party, it is not really what the app is for. See our comparison with Smule.
Watch-party tools
Watch2Gether and similar tools are free, browser-based, and built around a shared video queue with chat. Crucially, they synchronise playback to every participant's own device, so everyone sees the same moment of the same video wherever they are.
That makes them the best option in this list for friends in different houses. If your group is distributed, this is the category to use - synchronised playback is exactly the problem it solves, and no purpose-built karaoke tool in this list does it. More in our comparison with Watch2Gether.
Social Karaoke
Social Karaoke is our own tool, built for one specific situation: a group of people in the same room, singing to one screen. It is free with no paid tier, runs in a browser, and guests join with a 4-letter code or a QR scan and a nickname - no app, no account.
One host screen is the stage. Everyone's phone is a remote for searching YouTube and adding to a shared queue that shows who added each song, with upvotes to bump songs up and a majority vote to skip. Songs roll into each other automatically, and hosts can promote co-hosts or lock the room with a join PIN. There is more detail on our house party page.
Two things it does not do: audio and video play only on the host screen, so it is not suited to people in different places, and there is no recording, pitch scoring, or key adjustment of any kind. The reasoning behind that is on our about page.
Which should you pick?
If your friends are in the same room and you want to start now - Social Karaoke. Free, no installs, and everyone queues from their own phone.
If your friends are in different places - a watch-party tool like Watch2Gether. Synchronised playback on each person's own device is the thing that makes remote singing work.
If you care most about track quality and singable keys - a licensed karaoke app like KaraFun. The subscription buys consistency you cannot get from YouTube.
If you want to record and share your performance - a social singing app like Smule. Nothing else in this list captures audio at all.
If it is three people and a TV and you just want songs on - plain YouTube is fine. Do not overthink it.
At a glance
| Cost | Install | Songs from | Group in one room | Remote/distributed | Best for | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Just YouTube | Free | Nothing | YouTube | Works, but one person drives | No shared queue | Small groups, minimal setup |
| Licensed karaoke apps | Free tier; subscription for the full catalogue | Web or apps for phone, computer, TV | Licensed catalogue | Yes, including phone-based guest queueing | Varies by service | Consistent track quality and key control |
| Social singing apps | Free to join duets; subscription to start your own | Mobile app | Licensed catalogue | Built for online collaboration | Yes, by design | Recording and sharing performances |
| Watch-party tools | Free, with a paid upgrade tier | Nothing (extension for some sources) | YouTube, Vimeo, Dailymotion, SoundCloud | Works, not karaoke-specific | Yes - synchronised on every device | Watching or singing together from different places |
| Social Karaoke | Free, no paid tier | Nothing | YouTube karaoke, instrumental and lyric versions | Built for exactly this | No - audio plays on the host screen only | A karaoke night in one room |
Scroll the table sideways to see every column.
Common questions
What is the easiest free way to do karaoke with friends?
If everyone is in the same room, open a free browser-based karaoke app on the biggest screen available and have guests join from their phones to add songs to a shared queue. That avoids the usual problem where one person ends up operating a laptop all night, and it needs no installs or accounts for guests. If you would rather not use any app at all, searching YouTube on a TV works fine for a small group.
Do we need to pay for a karaoke app?
No. Plain YouTube, watch-party tools, and Social Karaoke are all free, and licensed services have free tiers with a limited song selection. Paying gets you a licensed catalogue with consistent track quality and the ability to change a song's key - worth it if you sing often, unnecessary for a one-off party.
Can we do karaoke with friends who aren't in the same room?
Yes, but not with every tool. Watch-party tools are the best option here, because they synchronise playback to each person's own device. Social Karaoke is not suited to it - audio and video play on the host's screen only, so remote guests would have to listen through a separate video call.
Do we need microphones?
No. Most home karaoke happens with people singing over the audio playing on the screen, and none of the free options require a microphone. A mic and speaker make it louder and more fun, but nothing in this list depends on one - and note that none of the browser-based options capture microphone audio at all.
What is the difference between karaoke tracks and instrumentals?
A karaoke track is an instrumental with the lyrics timed on screen so you can follow along, while a plain instrumental is just the backing music with no words displayed. There are also lyric videos, which show the words but keep the original vocals - a good fallback for songs with no proper karaoke version. Our guide to finding good karaoke versions on YouTube covers how to tell them apart.