In 2024, just 16.8 million digital albums were sold in the United States. This marks a decline of almost 10 percent as compared to the previous year, when 18.6 million digital albums were sold. Digital album sales peaked in 2012 and 2013, but have been dropping ever since and have even fallen drastically below the figures recorded prior to 2010.

In 2023, just 133.88 million digital songs were sold in the United States, reflecting a decline of 11.9 percent from the 151.9 million digital songs sold in 2022. This marks the 11th consecutive year of declining digital track sales. Also, a few years earlier digital music track sales surpassed the one billion mark on an annual basis, and hit a record in 2012 with over 1.3 billion songs sold. There has been a notable decline in sales in the last five years in particular, and the 2021 figure was more than four times smaller than the 964 million recorded in 2015.

In 2023, the value of digital music albums downloaded in the United States was 204.7 million U.S. dollars, down from nearly 242 million a year earlier. The year 2011 to 2015 saw the figure reach and remain above one billion U.S. dollars. Annual decreases of around 150 to 200 million per year for the last few years have seen the value drop back down to a similar level as in 2006.

In 2023, revenue from digital album downloads amounted to 204.7 million U.S. dollars, less than half the figure recorded in 2018. Meanwhile, subscription and streaming revenues have been increasing annually and reached 14.36 billion in 2023, making up the vast majority of revenues for the entire music industry. Digital music – additional informationThe increase in digital music revenue, more specifically subscription and streaming services, may be down to the accessibility and availability of digital music. For legal downloads, consumers can pick between services such as Spotify, Apple Music, and Pandora. Of course, there are countless numbers of illegal sites which distribute digital music also. In 2019, approximately 34 percent of global internet users aged 16 to 24 admitted to accessing music through music ripping, the most popular method being copyright infringement.Digital music sales have made a huge impact on the listings of best-selling lists with digital sales either being combined with physical sales or set apart. The list of the top-selling digital songs in the United States in 2020 features artists such as The Weeknd, Tones and I, and Megan Thee Stallion. The title for the top selling digital song goes to ‘Blinding Lights’ by The Weeknd. The song sold over 372 thousand units in the United States from January to July 2020. Nevertheless, the share of the digital music market does not always directly correspond to the value of the digital market. The value of digital music singles downloads in 2018 amounted to 490.4 million U.S. dollars, which marked a drop in value from 678.5 million in 2017. The value of digital album sales also saw a decrease from 668.5 million in 2017 to 499.7 million in 2018.

Annual music album sales in the United States dropped by roughly three percent between 2019 and 2021, amounting to just 109 million in the most recent year. This number decreased further to just 100 million in the U.S. in 2022. In 2013, sales amounted to 289.4 million units, a number which had already noticeably decreased from the 331 million units sold in 2011.

Annual music album sales - additional information

The past decade has brought along many changes, both technological and societal, which have forever changed the face of the global music industry. Today, music superstars, such as Beyonce, who was the highest paid musician in the United States in 2016, have money, coverage in all possible mediums, and power like never before. However, as of 2015, the worldwide revenue generated by the music business stood at 16.1 billion U.S. dollars, some nine billion less than in 2002.

It seems that the internet, the magical tool that is responsible for the creation of so many music celebrities, might also be responsible for the dismal statistics surrounding the sale of music albums in the United States, once the main revenue stream in the business. As the data shows, annual music album sales in the United States have plummeted from 500 million units sold in 2007 to under 170 million units sold in 2017. At the same time, digital music revenues, especially from album and single downloads, as well as subscription and streaming services, have been steadily growing in the past years. The fall in record sales is attributed to the rise of illegal music downloading, but also to legal services, which provide music products without the additional costs of production and shipping.

Despite changes in the way Americans acquire music, U.S. consumers still enjoy and value music industry products. Recent studies show that more consumers are choosing to use a legal alternative to file sharing, mainly digital music streaming services, such as online radio services like Pandora and Spotify. Additionally, musicians reorient themselves from album sales towards live performances and business deals to boost their incomes. As of 2017, the sales revenue from concert tickets in North America was at an all-time high, with revenue hit eight billion U.S. dollars for the first time.

As of April 2, 2024, the Taiwanese singer Jay Chou sold about 7.25 million copies of music album 'Greatest Works of Art' across the mainstream digital music platforms in China. R1SE, the Chinese idol boy band under Tencent, sold over three million copies of their first music album 'Going To Powerfully Burst', ranking the third bestseller. Taylor Swift was the only foreign music artists who could make to the top album sales ranking of all time.

The top-selling music album in the United States in 2021 based on digital unit sales was '30' by Adele, with 245 thousand copies sold, followed by Morgan Wallen's 'Dangerous: The Double Album' with 164 thousand units sold. Placing three albums in the digital music album charts once again shows Swift's musical dominance, as her albums 'Red (Taylor's Version)', 'Fearless (Taylor's Version)' and 'evermore' finished third, fourth and seventh in the Top10.

In 2024, the best-selling physical music album in South Korea was the EP "SPILL THE FEELS" by K-pop boy group SEVENTEEN, having sold around 3.2 million copies. With many parts of the global music industry moving away from physical sales to digital downloads and streaming, K-pop is a prominent exception. Through a combination of buying incentives, fandom culture, and the increasing popularity of K-pop, the genre has retained its larger focus on physical sales compared to many other genres. Music consumption in South Korea The most common purpose for purchasing physical albums is for collection purposes, and to directly support an artist, rather than utilizing the physical CD to listen to the music. The vast majority of South Koreans listened to music on their smartphones according to a 2024 survey, with CD players only being used by a small share of the population. Music streaming and downloading services are popular and enjoy frequent use. Incentives to buy physical albums One famous example of incentivizing the buying of physical albums that commonly occurs in the U.S. music industry is the bundling of merchandising or concert tickets with physical albums. This is not a common practice in the K-pop industry. Instead, each album offers unique merchandising and photobook concepts. Oftentimes, multiple versions of the same album will be released alongside several randomized collectible photo cards. Additionally, gaining entrance to fan signs is usually based on a lottery system which is entered by purchasing physical albums, with one album equaling one ticket. This phenomenon is mainly confined to the K-pop industry specifically, rather than being a feature of the larger South Korean music industry. As such, successful releases tend to differ between physical and digital rankings, with physical sales reflecting fandom buying power, and digital sales reflecting the taste of the general public. Physical rankings are generally dominated by K-pop artists, while digital rankings tend to be more diverse, with favored genres being ballads, OSTs, and trot music.

In 2023, global music revenue generated by digital music and downloads remained unchanged compared to the previous year, at the level of 0.9 billion U.S. dollars. It was the lowest figure reported since 2005.

Music streaming is still in the lead

The music industry has undergone fundamental changes due to the shifts in consumer demand and behavior. In 2022, global recorded music revenue hit an all-time high of around 28 billion U.S. dollars, and while this figure was partially fueled by the revival of the live music sector, the top driver of growth was streaming. Music streaming accounted for an estimated 67 percent of industry revenues in 2023, whereas digital downloads contributed less than five percent to the annual total. Audiences have come to prefer access models over ownership in recent years, which is no surprise considering the extensive range of titles available for a set rate on platforms like Spotify.

Best-selling titles

Most music lovers listen to their favorite tracks and discover new artists via streaming platforms. And yet, some fans also choose to pay for individual music purchases, be it via digital downloads or in physical formats. In 2023, Seventeen's “FML” was the best-selling music album worldwide, with over six billion units sold. The K-pop band featured two of its albums in the same ranking that year. However, when it comes to vinyl, Taylor Swift led the ranks there. Her albums took up the top three spots on a list oftop-selling vinyl albums that same year.

In 2023, a total of 37 million physical CDs were shipped in the United States. However, this figure marks a slight decrease from 37.7 million in the previous year. More than 900 million CDs were shipped in the United States in 2000, but the product has experienced a large decline in popularity in general since. Physical music sales Seen as the successor to vinyl records and cassette tapes, compact discs or CDs were one of the most popular prerecorded music formats for much of the 1990s and early 2000s. Competition, first in the form of digital music formats and then streaming, has led to a massive decline in total album sales, with the CD format being hit particularly hard. As of 2022, only 25 percent of people stated that they had used physical music such as CDs within the past year. In 2021, music streaming revenue accounted for around 83 percent of total industry revenue partially thanks to the ability of these platforms to provide users with instant access to an endless online library of music which can be enjoyed via any device at any time. While most physical album sales have suffered, vinyl albums have experienced a resurgence in recent years. The format’s total sales figures increased significantly in each year since 2010.

The statistic above presents growth of music album sales in the United States from 2009 to 2014, by genre. Rock album sales contracted by 8.3 percent in 2014. However, rock was still the bestselling gerne, having sold 85.25 million albums in 2014.

Change of music album sales in the United States by genreIn 2012, albums representing only three music genres—country, rock and soundtrack—rose in popularity among American consumers. Sales growth in these music genres ranged from 2 to 4.2 percent, relatively insignificant numbers, especially compared with losses sustained by other genres in the same period. Sales of jazz albums shrank by over a quarter, classical music over a fifth, and Latin music by nearly 18 percent.These figures back the results of recent consumer surveys, in which Americans were asked to specify their favorite music genre. In 2012, nearly 28 percent of adults named country and 27 percent named rock as their preferred style. Among teenagers, country and rock ranked high as well, taking second and fourth places respectively.Such results are only partly mirrored, however, in hard sales figures. Unit sales figures show that rock was the best-selling genre in 2012, with over 120 million albums sold. Country, meanwhile, ranked only fourth and was outsold by alternative music with over 52 million and R&B with nearly 50 million. More generally, album sales, especially physical album sales, are shrinking as Americans move their music consumption to digital platforms. Album sales contracted by 4.4 percent in 2012, whereas digital track sales grew by 5.1 percent. Thanks to the infusion of digital revenues, the music industry is developing positively and will continue on that track in the near future. In 2012, industry revenue grew 3.1 percent and generated in total 15 billion U.S. dollars. The figure is expected to reach 16 billion in 2017.

Data on the year-over-year changes in music sales in the United States from 2009 to 2023 show yearly increases in LP/vinyl album sales, which saw growth of 14.2 percent between 2022 and 2023. Meanwhile, digital album sales are declining, with a unit sales drop of almost 9.3 percent to 18.32 million in the last measured period.

As of April 2, 2024, Lim Junjie's music album 'Happily, painfully after' recorded a revenue of around 33.6 million yuan across the mainstream digital music platforms in China. K-pop albums occupied five spots of the top ten bestseller list so far in 2024.

In 2023, the highest selling album in the United Kingdom (UK) was 'The Highlights' by Weeknd, at over 390 thousand units through digital and physical sales in the UK. ‘MIdnights’ and '1989 (Taylor's Version)', both by Taylor Swift came in second and third, with nearly 340 thousand and nearly 300 units sold respectively. In the same year, sales retail revenue hit over 2.2 billion British pounds, of which, over 1.8 billion came from digital sales. Digital sales in 2019 grew to over 86 percent, an increase from the previous year. Music streaming In 2018, over 80 percent of UK individuals had streamed music at least once in the previous month. Demographics such as those aged between 12 and 15 years streamed music at least once a month. As of the first quarter of 2018, only 23 percent of music consumption came from CDs that were bought. The UK Rich list The UK’s richest musician as of 2019 was the composer Andrew Lloyd-Webber, who increased his personal wealth by 80 million British pounds from 2018. The ten richest musicians in the UK all hail from former generations of musicians, with no-one under the age of thirty even coming close in worth. The richest ‘young’ musician in the UK is currently Ed Sheeran, who had a personal worth of 160 million British pounds.

As of April 2, 2024, the best-selling music album in China was Lim Junjie's 'Happily, painfully after', with a sales volume of almost 934 thousand copies across mainstream digital music platforms. 'Have a nice weekend' from Yuchun Lee ranked second spot on the list with around 523.5 thousand copies sold.

The statistic presents data on music album sales in the United States from 2008 to 2014, broken down by genre. In 2014, 6.26 million Latin music albums were sold in the U.S. The most popular genre of the year was rock with 85.25 million albums sold. Country music was still very popular in the United States: in 2014, 30.46 million country albums albums sold, outselling such genres as pop and dance. On the whole, there were 240.7 million music albums sold in the United States in 2015, a number which fell to just over 200 million in 2016. Here you can find out which genres reported largest growth between 2009 and 2014.

Most popular music genre in the United States - additional information

Music made the transition from private pastime to a multi-billion industry as the widespread adoption of mass distribution channels, such as radio and TV, gained popularity over the years. Specialized music TV channels, such as MTV in the 1980s, added the visual aspect which enhanced the power of music. The internet then came to supply free videos on YouTube, as well as the gossip and the “who wore it better” columns, in order to craft industry superstars, like Beyoncé, Dr.Dre, Lady Gaga, and Taylor Swift. In fact, Taylor Swift is the musician with the highest payroll in the world; rock artists such as AC/DC, The Rolling Stones and Bruce Springsteen also appear in the top positions in the ranking.

The United States is not only home of many other internationally acclaimed artists, but it is also the origin of famous music genres such as jazz, country, blues, rock 'n' roll, hip hop, and pop. An online survey conducted in the U.S. points out that the most popular music genre in the U.S. is rock, with 40 percent of respondents choosing this option. The second and third most listened to music genres are oldies and country respectively, while hip hop/rap is favored by a smaller niche of American listeners. Rock is also the favorite road trip music of American travelers. This preference is reflected in album sales, where rock albums have outsold all the other music genres since 2008.

However, the sales of physical music album reflect just part of the consumption of this particular genre in the United States. Physical albums account for about 38 percent of rock’s music consumption, while 62 percent of rock music consumers prefer digital formats, for instance, digital albums or streaming services. As the consumption of digital music gains popularity, sales of music albums of all genres have been sinking, going from 500 million units sold in 2007 to around 200 million units sold in 2016.

When thinking about tuning into the newest Taylor Swift song or checking out the long-awaited new album by the Rolling Stones, most people will automatically head to their preferred streaming platform rather than into a CD or vinyl shop. This easy accessibility and flexibility make music streaming so popular, which is reflected in the revenues generated by both formats. In the United Kingdom, the biggest music market in Europe, digital music retail sales revenue amounted to a whopping 1.8 billion British pounds, compared to 311 million pounds earned through physical music retail sales. Back in 2011, physical music sales were still dominating the market but were overtaken by music streaming for the first time in 2015. The music market in the UK As in most music markets today, digital music is dominating the industry in the United Kingdom. Not only that, the UK is the biggest digital music market in Europe in terms of revenue. The UK reported a revenue of 1,7 billion U.S. dollars, followed by Germany with 875.4 million U.S. dollars. Considering the two digital formats, streaming and downloads, people seem to prefer music streaming. In 2023, music streaming generated nearly two billion U.S. dollars compared to 160.65 million U.S. dollars made by music downloads. Overall, the digital share of overall music sales in the UK made up 86 percent in 2022, showing the dominance of the format compared to older consumption mediums. Who is consuming music in the UK? Looking at the audience for music in the UK, it can be said that digital users are slightly more likely to be male, with 53.5 percent compared to 46.5 percent being women. Younger generations enjoy consuming music via streaming while their older counterparts use music streaming but also invest in physical copies of music. This is also reflected in the digital music streaming penetration, which is higher among younger age groups. The future of digital music is looking bright, with forecasts estimating that the industry will still grow in the coming years.

In 2024, K-pop boy group SEVENTEEN sold almost nine million albums. In the previous year, they achieved a remarkable milestone, with album sales reaching approximately 16.1 million copies, marking their most successful year to date. This record-breaking achievement solidified their position as one of the most successful and popular K-pop acts in history. They were the best-selling artist in South Korea in 2023 and 2024. Physical sales vs digital streaming In a global music industry where digital music streaming is prevalent, South Korea stands out due to the significant popularity of physical album sales, particularly within the K-pop genre. SEVENTEEN's 2023 album "FML" emerged as the best-selling physical music album in South Korea, reflecting the genre's emphasis on physical sales alongside digital downloads and streaming. The K-pop industry's success in physical album sales is largely attributed to buying incentives, fandom culture, and the unique merchandising concepts offered with each album, distinguishing it from trends in other music genres. However, digital streaming is still a major part of the industry, as evidenced by the high numbers of streams and views on popular songs and music. SEVENTEEN’s physical sales success was mirrored on digital streaming sites as well, with several of their digital singles being among the most-streamed songs that year. K-pop’s dominance and impact SEVENTEEN's exceptional album sales in 2023 and 2024 not only surpassed their own records, but also broke industry-wide benchmarks, including a six-year streak held by none other than BTS. This accomplishment underscores the rapid growth and dominance of album sales in South Korea, which has seen an over tenfold increase in the past decade. The majority of these sales come from the K-pop industry, with other genres seeing far fewer physical sales, both from domestic and international fans.

The top-selling digital album in Canada in the first half of 2021 was 'Phoenix' by Charlotte Cardin with 10 thousand units sold. The album far outperformed all the other albums in the ranking, selling two thousand more digital copies than 'Standing Under Bright Light' by Alex Henry Foster and Taylor Swift's new recorded album of old songs 'Fearless'.

Digital music album sales decreased dramatically in Finland from 2013 onwards. In 2023, the revenue generated from full digital album sales amounted to approximately 195.000 euros.