In 2024, the total revenue of the recorded music industry amounted to **** billion U.S. dollars. Global streaming revenues reached **** billion U.S. dollars in the same year. Overall, recorded music increased by nearly **** percent, representing a steady growth rate compared to the previous year. Music streaming – the motor of the industry Data on the revenue generated by the different segments of the music industry worldwide show that music streaming is responsible for by far the biggest share in the industry in recent years. The streaming revenue has been growing year by year since the late 2000s and early 2010s and overtook the revenue from physical sales as of 2017. With two thirds of the global music revenue in 2024 coming from streaming, it was undoubtedly the backbone of the industry. Smaller regional markets are catching up While the global music market rose by around five percent in 2024, this growth rate varied significantly when broken down regionally. Whereas growth in the biggest regional music markets, North America, Asia and Europe, remained in single digits, the music markets in Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, and the MENA region grew at a fairly high rate respectively.

Trusted with the task of providing the world with new music, record labels have a massive influence on the music market. But which record companies play an important role? In 2024, Universal Music Group held the largest share of the market when it came to both physical and digital, with a market share of **** percent. Independents' share amounted to **** percent that year, less than *** percent lower than that of Universal Music Group, which remained the biggest record label in the world in 2024 with more than ****** the market share held by WMG. The Big Three are dominating the market Overall, the music market is dominated by three companies: Sony Music Group, Universal Music Group, as well as Warner Music Group. Sony Music Group is made up of Sony Music and Sony Music Publishing. Founded in 1929 as the American Record Corporation, the New York based company is currently the largest music publisher in the world. The music segment alone generated a revenue of over ** billion U.S. dollars in 2024. In terms of revenue, the company comes second with a market share of over ** percent. The only company with a higher market share was the Universal Music Group. As one of the three major music publishers, UMG consists of four sectors: recorded music, music publishing as well as artist services and merchandise. The reason for the company’s success is undeniable when looking at the current charts: UMG has contracts with some of the most successful artists of our generation such as Billie Eilish, Dua Lipa, or Eminem. Even though Warner Music has the smallest market share of the three, it is still a major player in the record music industry. The U.S. company has artists such as Ed Sheeran, Robin Schulz or the Red Hot Chilli Peppers under contract. The music market is evolvingIn 2024, the total revenue of the recorded music industry amounted to **** billion U.S. dollars. Global streaming revenues reached over ** billion U.S. dollars in the same year. Overall, recorded music increased by ** percent. Streaming and subscriptions especially contribute to the high digital music revenue, reaching roughly **** billion U.S. dollars in 2024. The number of downloads on the other hand has been decreasing steadily over the last 15 years- a development that is likely to continue.

Music Artist Services Market Outlook

According to our latest research, the global music artist services market size reached USD 8.4 billion in 2024, reflecting a robust industry that is increasingly vital to the modern music ecosystem. The market is poised for dynamic growth, with a projected CAGR of 11.2% from 2025 to 2033. By the end of the forecast period, the music artist services market is expected to attain a value of USD 24.1 billion. This impressive growth trajectory is driven by the digital transformation of the music industry, the proliferation of independent artists, and the increasing importance of ancillary revenue streams such as merchandising and live performances.

The expansion of the music artist services market can be attributed to several key growth factors. Foremost among these is the rapid digitalization of the music industry, which has fundamentally altered how music is produced, distributed, and consumed. With the advent of streaming platforms, artists now have unprecedented access to global audiences, but this has also intensified the need for professional services such as digital distribution, marketing, and rights management. As artists navigate the complexities of digital platforms, specialized service providers have emerged to offer tailored solutions that maximize reach and revenue. This shift is particularly significant for independent artists, who increasingly rely on third-party services to compete with major label-backed acts and to manage the multifaceted demands of a modern music career.

Another critical driver of growth in the music artist services market is the diversification of revenue streams for artists. In an era where streaming royalties often provide modest returns, artists are seeking new avenues to monetize their work and engage with fans. Services such as merchandising, live event booking, and direct-to-fan platforms have become essential components of an artist’s business strategy. These offerings not only supplement income but also help to build and sustain fan communities. The proliferation of social media and e-commerce platforms has further democratized access to these services, enabling artists at all levels to leverage professional support in areas such as promotion, tour management, and merchandise sales. This trend is expected to continue as artists increasingly adopt a DIY ethos while seeking scalable, professional solutions to grow their careers.

The music artist services market is also being shaped by evolving consumer behaviors and technological innovation. Fans are now demanding more personalized and immersive experiences, prompting artists and service providers to explore innovative engagement strategies. Technologies such as artificial intelligence, data analytics, and blockchain are being harnessed to offer smarter rights management, targeted marketing, and transparent royalty tracking. These advancements not only enhance operational efficiency but also empower artists to make data-driven decisions about their careers. As the competitive landscape intensifies, the ability to offer integrated, technology-driven solutions will be a key differentiator for service providers in this market.

From a regional perspective, North America continues to dominate the music artist services market, accounting for the largest share in 2024. This leadership is underpinned by the region’s mature music industry infrastructure, high digital adoption rates, and a large base of independent artists and established labels. However, Asia Pacific is emerging as the fastest-growing region, driven by a burgeoning youth population, rising internet penetration, and increasing investment in local music ecosystems. Europe also remains a significant market, characterized by a rich cultural heritage and a strong presence of both independent and major music companies. Meanwhile, Latin America and the Middle East & Africa are demonstrating substantial potential, fueled by the rapid growth of local music scenes and the adoption of digital platforms. The global nature of the music industry ensures that regional dynamics will continue to evolve, presenting both opportunities and challenges for market participants.

Service Type Analysis

The music artist services market is segmented by service type into distribution, marketing & promotion, rights management, booking & touring, merchandising, and others. Among these, distribution services remain the backbone of the market, enabling artist

According to a 2020 study exploring the global music industry, worldwide live music sponsorship revenues will amount to **** billion U.S. dollars in 2024. The projected figure for 2020 was *** billion U.S. dollars, with ticket sales for that year estimated at around ***** billion. The effects of the coronavirus pandemic on the live music industry have been extremely detrimental to revenue generation, affecting artists, venues, and events companies alike. Whilst it is anticipated that live will begin to recover in 2021, naturally this depends on the amount of venues able to reopen, the size of those venues, and the number of events allowed to take place.

The Music Market Report is Segmented by Revenue Generation Format (Streaming, Digital Downloads, and More), Genre (Pop, Rock, Hip-Hop/Rap, Electronic/Dance, and More), Distribution Channel (Online Platforms, and Offline/Brick-and-Mortar Retail), End User (Individual Consumers, Commercial Establishments, Media and Entertainment Producers, and More), and Geography. The Market Forecasts are Provided in Terms of Value (USD).

The Live Music market has emerged as a dynamic and integral component of the global entertainment industry, showcasing an unparalleled blend of culture, passion, and economic potential. With a current market size valued at several billion dollars, it draws millions of attendees each year, ranging from intimate local

Discover the booming royalty-free music market! This comprehensive analysis reveals key trends, growth drivers, and challenges in the industry, projecting a multi-billion dollar market by 2033. Learn about leading companies, regional insights, and future projections for no copyright music.

Revenue generated from Sony’s game and network services amounted to 31.16 billion U.S. dollars in the company’s 2024 fiscal year, making it Sony’s largest business segment. Other major business segments include Music and Pictures services, which brought in 12.29 and 10.05 billion U.S. dollars respectively in the same fiscal year. Overall, Sony’s revenue reached around 86.45 billion U.S. dollars in that year, making it one of the 100 largest companies worldwide. Diverse businesses Headquartered in the Minato District of Tokyo, Sony is a multinational conglomerate corporation with businesses across industries. Different generations of Sony’s PlayStation consoles are among the best-selling game consoles worldwide. For example, PlayStation 2 sold 158.7 million units across its lifetime, making it the most popular video game console ever. Sony is also the leader in the music publishing industry, having a market share of almost 25 percent in 2022.

In 2024, Universal Music Group generated ***** billion euros in revenue, up from ***** billion in the previous year. UMG is the largest record company worldwide and parent company Vivendi's most profitable business segment. Universal Music Group sets the tone Universal Music Group (UMG) is the leading record label in the world, boasting an impressive roaster of sub-labels and artists from more than ** countries. According to the company's most recent financial statements, recorded music remains UMG's most lucrative business segment, generating higher revenue streams than music publishing and merchandising combined. Universal was the label with the highest share in the recorded music market worldwide in 2022, accounting for roughly ** percent of combined physical and digital music trade revenue that year. Meanwhile, revenue generated from Universal Music Group's music publishing segment surpassed *** billion U.S. dollars for the first time, reaching **** billion U.S. dollars globally in 2024. Record labels: the best things come in threes Universal Music Group is the largest of the so-called “Big Three” record labels in the United States, followed by Warner Music Group and Sony Music Group. Together, these companies make up the lion's share of the global music publishing market, although independent labels also carve out impressive slices of the industry pie each year. As of 2022, * of the * major label groups, Universal and Warner, have sold company shares to Tencent Music Entertainment Group, the music streaming arm of Chinese technology and entertainment giant Tencent Holdings.

In 2024, Live Nation's concert revenue amounted to 19.02 billion U.S. dollars, up from 18.76 billion generated in the previous year. Whilst the company's revenues had been growing steadily over the last decade, 2020 was a difficult year; In early March 2020, the coronavirus outbreak severely impacted the events industry as governments and companies were forced to close venues and cancel events in a bid to protect the public and prevent the further spread of the disease. Live Nation's share price was hit hard, but only time will tell how deeply affected the company will be as a result of the pandemic. Live Nation Entertainment's concert revenue Live Nation Entertainment draws revenue from the following segments of its activities: sponsorship and advertising, ticketing and concerts. The concert business involves operating music venues and promoting the live music events taking place. In 2022, after two years of weak results, Live Nation Entertainment managed to peak at its concert revenues, hopefully sparking a period of growth for the company. The live event promoter organized an increasing number of concerts and festivals around the world, helping to drive revenues. At its peak, the company promoted over 40 thousand events. However restrictions on events due to the coronavirus outbreak resulted in only around eight thousand events taking place in 2020.Live music is a popular and profitable form of entertainment. In 2024, the tour that brought in the highest revenue globally was Taylor Swift's Eras Tour, which generated over 1.04 billion U.S. dollars in revenue. Taylor Swift also dominated the North American market—her 2023 tour was the top earner for the year, bringing in over 905 million U.S. dollars.

YouTube was launched in 2005. It was founded by three PayPal employees: Chad Hurley, Steve Chen, and Jawed Karim, who ran the company from an office above a small restaurant in San Mateo. The first...

Annual music album sales in the United States dropped by roughly ***** percent between 2019 and 2021, amounting to just *** million in the most recent year. This number decreased further to just *** million in the U.S. in 2022. In 2013, sales amounted to ***** million units, a number which had already noticeably decreased from the *** 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 **** billion U.S. dollars, some **** 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 *** million units sold in 2007 to under *** 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 ***** billion U.S. dollars for the first time.

The graph presents data on music streaming revenue worldwide from 2010 to 2015, broken down by type. Ad-supported music streaming revenue increased from *** to *** billion U.S. dollars in the presented period.

Music streaming revenue – additional information

The rise of the internet in the past two decades has dramatically changed the music industry on many levels. The popularity of streaming services such as Spotify, Apple Music, Deezer, and Rdio is one of these major changes in the industry. Currently, music streaming services have two main revenue streams: subscriptions and advertising. Since 2010, the music streaming industry has seen a rise in subscriptions revenue, which has become the main revenue stream for this business. In 2010, subscriptions generated about *** million U.S. dollars in revenues for music streaming services. By 2015, this figure grew to *** billion U.S. dollars. Ad-supported music streaming revenue has also seen a small increase during the same time period, going from *** million U.S. dollars in 2010 to *** million U.S. dollars in 2015. Overall, music streaming revenue worldwide showed optimistic figures in the last few years, as the growth rate has varied between **** percent and ** percent from 2010 to 2015.

In the U.S., the revenue from music streaming services has also grown at a fast pace since 2010, jumping from *** million U.S. dollars that year to *** billion U.S. dollars in 2015. This growth also had an impact on the music streaming revenue share in the U.S. In 2009, streaming services only accounted for **** percent of the total music revenue in the country. This share grew to ** percent in 2015, the highest figure to date. The coming years are promising for music streaming services in the country.

While other sources of digital music such as downloading and mobile music digital are forecast to see a small decline in the next years, music streaming services are projected to increase its revenue in the U.S.

Global movies and entertainment market worth at USD 108.84 Billion in 2024, is expected to surpass USD 221.22 Billion by 2034, with a CAGR of 7.35%.

This statistic presents the cost of Spotify's royalty fees and distribution costs payable to music artists and license holders from 2012 to 2015. In the most recently reported year, the streaming platform paid out 1.62 billion euros in royalty fees. Further information With more than 100 million monthly active users worldwide, Spotify is one of the most popular music streaming platforms. Founded in Sweden in 2006, the service was available in 59 countries as of February 2016. As of the same period, Spotify had a brand awareness of 52 percent in the United States, ranking behind local competitors Pandora, Apple Music and iHeartRadio. The music streaming service operates under the freemium business model, with basic services being free and additional features such as offline mobile support and ad-free listening offered via paid subscriptions.

Spotify generates the majority of its revenues via subscriptions – in 2015, subscription revenues amounted to 1.74 billion euros, representing a 78 percent growth from the previous year. In March 2016, Spotify reported having 30 million paying users. Despite all of this, the company has yet to report a profit, as the most recently reported net loss amounted to over 173 million euros.

Like YouTube, the company has a contentious relationship with the music industry. Critics argue that artists and music rights holders are not compensated adequately for their music streams. In 2015, digital music accounted for 6.7 billion U.S. dollars of recorded music market revenues worldwide, surpassing traditional music sales and arguably reviving music sales overall. Nonetheless, streaming experts find that the compensation of artists via digital royalty fees is still lacking when compared with streaming platform revenues and the number of streams.

In 2024, Spotify reported its first-ever annual net profit of 1.14 billion euros, after a net loss of 532 million euros in 2023 and 430 million euros in 2022. This turnaround reflects strong revenue growth, cost optimizations, and a surge in premium subscribers. Since its launch, the company has struggled with profitability, experiencing its largest net loss of 581 million euros in 2020. However, with increasing revenues and strategic adjustments, Spotify has solidified its position as a leader in the music streaming industry. Further information Spotify is one of the leading online streaming services worldwide, experiencing rapid growth over the years. With a compound annual growth rate of 61 percent over 14 years, the platform reached 265 million paying subscribers by the end of 2024. The music streaming service also hit an all-time high of 640 million active users globally, marking a 12 percent increase in just one year. Spotify has proved popular across various markets, cementing its position as the dominant player in the digital music industry. Spotify has proved popular in multiple markets across the world, namely the United States, where more than 25 percent of 18 to 34-year-olds reported using the service. Spotify’s appeal does not only lie in its music streaming and online radio capabilities but the platform’s strong social components such as users being able to add and message friends, as well as being able to create and share music playlists as well as recommend tracks to connected users. Spotify also allows users to login with their Facebook accounts and to cross-post their listening habits to the social network In 2015, the company’s revenue surpassed 1 billion euros for the first time but not without a cost – that year, Spotify’s net loss amounted to 162 million euros. A major part of Spotify’s expenses are the royalty fees that the streaming platform has to pay to the music artists and license holders, with payments amounting to over 882 million U.S. dollars in 2014. As the music streaming industry continues to expand, digital streaming revenue in the United States reached 14.36 billion U.S. dollars in 2023, accounting for the majority of the music industry’s total revenue.

Estimates suggest that Apple Music had 95 million subscribers worldwide in June 2024, up by 2 million from the previous year. Launched in 2015 by U.S. tech giant Apple, Apple Music is the second largest music streaming service worldwide, competing with market leader Spotify. Spotify remains market leader While Apple Music is a popular music streaming platform, accounting for 12.6 percent of subscribers worldwide, the 2008 founded streaming service Spotify remains the market leader with a subscriber share of nearly 32 percent. Financially this meant that the Swedish company generated a global revenue of 3.7 billion euros through its Premium accounts in the fourth quarter of 2024 alone.Music streaming overall increasesOverall, music streaming has experienced significant growth over the last decade. Even if the annual growth rate is gradually declining, it still stood at over 7 percent in 2024, becoming the music industry’s main revenue driver and reaching a revenue of 20 billion U.S. dollars worldwide in 2024.

In 2024, music publishers in the United States earned almost two billion U.S. dollars from royalties. That represented 27 percent of the total music publishing revenue generated in that year.

In 2021, Italian record labels concentrated in few regions. As of *********, the greatest number of labels was in Lombardy (), Lazio (), and Emilia-Romagna (***). This can be associated with the number of record stores in Italy, mainly located in these three regions and also in Veneto and Piedmont.

Death of physical music? The activities of record labels and record stores are often related to the market of physical music in general. In 2019, while the value of the Italian music streaming market reached about *** million euros, the market value of physical music decreased to ** million euros.

Record labels and music streaming: global overview The business of record labels must not be considered as opposite to the music streaming industry. Record companies had to differentiate their business in order to generate revenues, aside from physical music. Globally, big record labels like Universal, Sony or Warner had significant market shares in the streaming sector and the revenues generated from streaming increased from *** to *** billion U.S. dollars only in the years between 2015 and 2017.

In 2024, music streaming service Spotify generated a revenue of ***** billion euros, reaching company’s first-ever full year of profitability. The majority of Spotify's revenues came from its premium subscribers rather than ad placements. Founded in Stockholm in 2005, the former start-up is now a market leader in the digital music streaming sector, competing alongside established companies such as Apple and their streaming service Apple Music. Spotify’s record operating income in 2024 While Spotify has established itself as a market leader, generating high revenue, it has also seen a significant turnaround in operating income. The company moved from a loss of *** million euros in 2023 to a record operating profit of **** billion euros in 2024. This milestone was driven by growth in revenue, cost optimizations, and a surge in premium subscriptions. The net income of Spotify seems to confirm this, as Spotify recorded a net profit of **** billion euros in 2024, compared to a net loss of *** million euros in 2023 and *** million euros in 2022. The music streaming market is expanding While Spotify has struggled with generating an operating income, the music streaming market is actually expanding. The number of subscribers to music streaming services has steadily been rising, highlighting the increased popularity of digital music consumption. While this development goes hand in hand with a decrease in physical music sales, the more recent upsurge in audio content streaming can partly also be attributed to the heightened demand in entertainment caused by the coronavirus pandemic.