Apple generated over 69 billion U.S. dollars in revenue from iPhone sales in the first quarter of the 2025 financial year. Apple revenue streams Apple registered its highest revenue to date in FY 2022, when the company’s revenue stood at over 394 billion U.S. dollars. Apple’s success over the years can be explained by strong brand loyalty, and the constant release of innovative products, updates and features. The iPod, for example, was one of the first successful releases of the company to the consumer market. However, according to industry experts, the increased capacity of smartphones to play and store music led to the decline of digital music devices sales, such as the iPod. Rise of Apple iPhone Since its introduction in 2007, Apple’s iPhone has gained space in the market. In the first quarter of Apple's 2025 financial year iPhone sales revenue stood at over 69 billion U.S. dollars. The increase in devices sales had a direct impact on the iPhone’s share of the company’s total revenue. In the beginning of 2009, sales of the iPhone accounted for about 25 percent of Apple’s total revenue. By the first quarter of 2025, this share was at around 55 percent. Other products and services Apple’s iPad tablet, the Mac computer and costumer services are important revenue streams as well for Apple. Together, these three revenue streams generated over 43 billion U.S. dollars for the company in the first quarter of the 2025 fiscal year. Other products such as wearables, home, and accessories generated over 11 billion U.S. dollars in the same quarter.

First released in 2003 by Valve Corporation, Steam is one of the leading PC gaming platform for gamers across the world. Through releasing its first-party games and other offerings from third-party developers and publishers, it is estimated that Steam generated about 10.8 billion U.S. dollars in game sale revenues in 2024. Steam still going strong Despite fierce competition from console rivals and the decline of game revenue, Steam still manages to hold on to a loyal legion of fans. In 2023, Steam reported 33 million peak concurrent players on its platform, up from 27.4 million peak concurrent players in 2021. Steam’s biggest game There are a staggering amount of games released each year on Steam, with over 10,600 alone arriving on the platform in 2022. These games can vary from classic shooter games to farming simulators, yet it is a very small fraction of the games that bring in the big bucks. The average price of a video game on Steam was 15.20 U.S. dollars in 2023.

In 2023, the 32 teams of the National Football League (NFL) generated a total revenue of approximately 20.2 billion U.S. dollars. This shows an increase of nearly two billion U.S. dollars over the previous year. How does the NFL compare to other major sports leagues? The NFL is the most profitable professional sports league in the United States. Between 2001 and 2019, the total revenue of all 32 NFL teams steadily increased, reaching 15 billion U.S. dollars in 2019. This figure dropped to approximately 12.2 billion U.S. dollars in 2020, due to the impact of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, however, shot back up in 2021 to exceed pre-pandemic levels. In comparison, the revenue generated by Major League Baseball (MLB) teams amounted to around 11.34 billion U.S. dollars in 2023, while the revenue of the National Basketball Association (NBA) was 10.58 billion U.S. dollars in the 2022/23 season. NFL revenue streams In the list of most watched TV programs in the U.S., football games dominate the top spots. Duly, the NFL has a diverse array of lucrative revenue streams, such as sponsorships, media partnerships (both broadcasting and digital), ticket sales and concessions. As of February 2024, media deals between the NFL and networks in the United States alone accounted for over 10 billion U.S. dollars annually. Meanwhile, NFL league and team sponsorships provided nearly 1.9 billion U.S. dollars in revenue in 2022. Which team generates the most income? In 2023, the five-time Super Bowl champion Dallas Cowboys topped the rankings of NFL teams with the highest revenues. That year, the Cowboys were the only team to generate more than one billion U.S. dollars in revenue. The Las Vegas Raiders ranked second with approximately 779 million U.S. dollars in revenue. Meanwhile, the team with the most Super Bowl titles of the last 20 years- the New England Patriots- sat in fourth place with 712 million U.S. dollars in revenue.

The graph shows the share of music streaming label revenue worldwide in the second quarter of 2016. According to the source, Spotify had a 40 percent revenue share of the global music streaming market in 2016.

In 2024, music streaming service Spotify generated a revenue of 15.67 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 446 million euros in 2023 to a record operating profit of 1.37 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 1.14 billion euros in 2024, compared to a net loss of 532 million euros in 2023 and 430 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.

In 2024, Netflix reported a revenue of nearly 17 billion U.S. dollars in the United States and Canada, up from around 15 billion in the previous year. The revenue generated in the North American countries was more than triple the amount brought in from Latin America and Asia Pacific. Netflix faces challenge to keep growing While the EMEA (Europe, Middle East, and Africa) region is Netflix’s second largest market in terms of revenue, the subscriber base in this region surpassed that in the U.S. and Canada for the first time in 2022. These countries experienced the most substantial combined subscriber loss when Netflix struggled to continue to grow in the same year as the service’s price has increased significantly over the past few years, leading audiences to switch to more affordable entertainment options. However, after this reported drop, the streaming giant seems to be back on track, adding around 30 million net subscribers in only one year. Consumers’ perception of Netflix Netflix has long been the SVOD market leader worldwide, despite rising competition. However, the perception of the streaming giant has taken a hit in the last few years. While the share of customers who were satisfied with Netflix amounted to 90 percent in 2021, the satisfaction rate declined below the 80 percent mark. Moreover, a survey asking users about eight different streaming services revealed that Netflix saw the highest year-over-year drops in the share of subscribers who were likely to keep the platform between 2021 and 2023.

In 2024, the total revenue of the video streaming platform Netflix amounted to approximately 39 billion U.S. dollars, having grown from 5.5 billion U.S. dollars a decade ago. The American media company's net income in 2023 stood at 8.7 billion U.S. dollars, with a total of 14,000 employees working at the company worldwide. The fiscal year end of the company is December 31. Netflix annual revenue – additional information Netflix has been very successful in the last few years. The company not only leads the subscription streaming market in the U.S., but is effectively expanding its service outside North America. Along with gaining numerous subscribers worldwide, Netflix has managed to produce and distribute high-profile original shows, such as "House of Cards" and "Orange is the New Black," challenging traditional TV networks like HBO and CBS. In 2023, Netflix’s original programs received 103 Emmy Awards nominations, around double the number of nominations received seven years previously. These are just a few indicators of Netflix’s success, which can be measured in a number of ways. Firstly, as seen in the statistic, Netflix’s annual revenue has consistently increased over the years, reaching the highest figure to date in 2023 – 33.7 billion U.S. dollars. This figure is around 10 times higher than Netflix’s annual revenue a decade ago. Netflix's originals The time that consumers dedicate to watching Netflix content is another way of indicating success. One of Netflix’s strategies has been to release TV series in bulk, so consumers are able to binge watch their favorite shows. Indeed, Netflix accounts for the highest share of most in-demand originals among global video streaming services. As a result, Netflix's streaming content obligations have increased from 1.3 billion U.S. dollars in 2010 to over 20 billion U.S. dollars in 2023.

Advertising remained the main revenue-generating segment for Google in 2024. During the examined year, 77.8 percent of Google’s revenue came from advertising on Google properties and YouTube. The Google Cloud revenue segment generated 10.8 percent of the company's revenues, up from 4.3 percent in 2018.

In 2024, Meta Platforms generated a revenue of over 164 billion U.S. dollars, up from 134 billion USD in 2023. The majority of Meta’s profits come from its advertising revenue.Meta’s total Family of Apps revenue for 2022 amounted to 114 billion U.S. dollars. Additionally, Meta’s Reality Labs, the company’s VR division, generated around 2.1 billion dollars. Meta’s marketing expenditure for 2022 amounted to just over 15 billion U.S. dollars, up from 14 billion U.S. dollars in the previous year. Increasing audience base despite privacy misgivings Meta’s user numbers have continued to grow steadily throughout past years. In the fourth quarter of 2022, there was a total of 3.74 billion worldwide users across all of Meta’s platforms. For this same time frame, the company recorded 407 million monthly active users across Europe. Downloads of Meta’s app Oculus, for which virtual reality headsets are required, increased greatly from 2020 to 2021, reaching a total of 10.62 million downloads by the end of last year. Up until 2021, downloads had grown in a steady manner but from 2020 to 2021, they more than doubled.User numbers have increased despite data security issues and past controversy such as the Cambridge Analytica scandal in 2018. There remains skepticism surrounding the idea of the metaverse in which Meta aims to immerse itself. Of surveyed adults in the United States, the majority said that they were concerned about their privacy if Meta were to succeed in creating the metaverse.

Meta Platforms, formerly known as Facebook Inc., continues to dominate the digital landscape with impressive financial growth. In 2024, the company's annual revenue reached a staggering 164.5 billion U.S. dollars, marking a significant increase from 134.9 billion U.S. dollars in the previous year. This upward trajectory reflects Meta's ability to monetize its vast user base across multiple platforms, solidifying its position as a tech giant. Advertising remains the primary revenue driver The bulk of Meta's revenue stems from its advertising operations, particularly within its Family of Apps segment. In 2024, this segment, which includes Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and WhatsApp, generated 162 billion U.S. dollars. Despite a slight dip in 2022, Meta's advertising revenue has shown remarkable resilience and growth potential. User engagement and global reach The company's global influence is further illustrated by the fact that every minute, 138.9 million Reels are played on Facebook and Instagram, showcasing the ongoing evolution of user engagement within the Meta ecosystem.

In 2024, the Walt Disney Company generated a revenue of nearly 34.2 billion U.S. dollars with its parks, and experiences, an increase of around 4.9 percent from the year before. The company's biggest revenue source was its entertainment segment, which generated revenues of over 41 billion U.S. dollars in 2024. This marked a growth of 1.4 percent year-on-year. The total assets of the Walt Disney Company amounted to more than 196 billion U.S. dollars in 2024.Additional info: Walt Disney Company's revenue by operating segmentIn 2023, the Walt Disney Company generated over 19 percent of its revenue through its sports segment which includes the ESPN properties. This revenue stream brought the company 17 billion U.S. dollars that year.The experiences segment was the second-largest revenue source, generating a total of 32.6 billion U.S. dollars. It is a very successful segment – Disney’s parks take the top spots in the ranking of the most visited amusement and theme parks worldwide. The Magic Kingdom Park in Bay Lake, Florida, ranked first in 2022 with 17 million visitors. The largest revenue stream – with over 40 billion U.S. dollars – was the entertainment business. This segment includes linear networks, direct-to-consumer (DTC) business and content sales and licensing. The DTC operations comprise of the company's streaming services such as Disney+, Disney+ Hotstar, and Hulu. This subsegment brought in more than five billion U.S. dollars in the last quarter of 2023.

In the most recently reported fiscal year, Google's revenue amounted to 348.16 billion U.S. dollars. Google's revenue is largely made up by advertising revenue, which amounted to 264.59 billion U.S. dollars in 2024. As of October 2024, parent company Alphabet ranked first among worldwide internet companies, with a market capitalization of 2,02 billion U.S. dollars. Google’s revenue Founded in 1998, Google is a multinational internet service corporation headquartered in California, United States. Initially conceptualized as a web search engine based on a PageRank algorithm, Google now offers a multitude of desktop, mobile and online products. Google Search remains the company’s core web-based product along with advertising services, communication and publishing tools, development and statistical tools as well as map-related products. Google is also the producer of the mobile operating system Android, Chrome OS, Google TV as well as desktop and mobile applications such as the internet browser Google Chrome or mobile web applications based on pre-existing Google products. Recently, Google has also been developing selected pieces of hardware which ranges from the Nexus series of mobile devices to smart home devices and driverless cars. Due to its immense scale, Google also offers a crisis response service covering disasters, turmoil and emergencies, as well as an open source missing person finder in times of disaster. Despite the vast scope of Google products, the company still collects the majority of its revenue through online advertising on Google Site and Google network websites. Other revenues are generated via product licensing and most recently, digital content and mobile apps via the Google Play Store, a distribution platform for digital content. As of September 2020, some of the highest-grossing Android apps worldwide included mobile games such as Candy Crush Saga, Pokemon Go, and Coin Master.

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.

This graph depicts the revenue of the music industry worldwide from 2002 to 2014, broken down by category. In 2014, revenue generated by digital music amounted to 6.85 billion U.S. dollars.

Music industry revenues worldwide – additional information

The worldwide music industry revenue is often broken down by digital, physical, performance rights, and synchronization revenues. A forecast made in June 2016 of the compound annual growth rate of global music revenue between 2015 and 2020, by category, outlines which sectors of the industry are expected to perform well. It was predicted that digital music streaming revenue would grow by 21.65 percent annually. However, it was estimated that digital music downloading would decrease by 14.26 percent annually in the presented period and physical recorded music revenue is expected to experience a 12 percent reduction annually.

Digital music’s expected dominance does not necessarily render traditional music formats defunct. Vinyl or LP records, which have been played since the 1920s, have had their worldwide sales recorded from 1997 to 2015. In 1997, vinyl records generated 137 million U.S. dollars. However by 2006, their popularity appeared to have diminished as revenue dropped to a low of just 34 million U.S. dollars. Surprisingly, the traditional format has undergone a revival as worldwide sales generated a record 416 million U.S. dollars in 2015.

In 2024, video game publisher and software developer Epic Games is projected to generate approximately 5.8 billion U.S. dollars in gross revenues, up from 5.1 billion U.S. dollars in 2020.

How does Epic Games make money? Epic Games' gross does not only include game revenue from the company battle royale hit Fortnite, but also engine revenue derived from game licenses and royalties, as well as Unreal Engine assets. Epic is the developer of the gaming engine Unreal Engine, which is currently monetized under a royalty model, meaning that is can be downloaded for free and Epic claims a percentage of sales revenue. Currently, Epic is not claiming a fee for developers that publish their games on the Epic Games Store. The Epic Games Store (EGS) was launched in December 2018. In May 2020, Epic announced that their share of royalties for games developed in Unreal Engine are waived until developers have earned their first 1 million U.S. dollars in revenue. Other income streams of the company include Epic Games Store revenue, and Merchandise and other revenue. Epic Games Store upsetting the industry standard One of the biggest headlines regarding the launch of Epic’s own digital storefront was the company’s attitude to developer / store revenue split. Gaming stores and app platforms including Valve’s Steam, the Apple App Store, or Google Play, usually take a 30 percent commission cut from game sales and in-game revenues. The Epic Games Store was released with the announcement that the EGS would only claim 12 percent of revenue, leaving 88 percent to the developers. This approach, as well as Epic’s attempt to circumvent Apple’s monetization strategies in the iOS app of Fortnite, has made many headlines, led to Apple removing the app from its App Store, and resulted in the still ongoing lawsuit Epic vs. Apple.

In the most recent reported fiscal year, Spotify generated about 11.5 billion euros in premium revenue and 1681 million in ad-supported revenue. Both figures were the highest reported to date, with premium revenue having grown by more than two billion euros since 2017. Contributing to Spotify’s success was its strong global subscriber base – as of the first quarter of 2020, the music streaming platform had 100 million subscribers worldwide. 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 competition Spotify’s closest competitor is Apple Music. That said, Apple’s worldwide subscribers are almost half that of Spotify’s, despite both services being popular for different reasons. Theoretically, Pandora Radio could have presented Spotify with a fair amount of competition, but this was not to be. Pandora’s radio station format failed to match Spotify’s playlist set-up in terms of popularity, and Pandora struggled to convert its users into paid subscribers, something which Spotify has always been good at. Pandora Radio received heavy investment from Sirius XM in 2017 and was officially acquired by the company in early 2019, so it will be interesting to see what happens in the future as Sirius gets to work on Pandora’s audience and attempts to generate cash from its arguably wide (but unpaid) user base. For now though, it seems that Spotify’s position remains safe.

In 2023, the total revenue of the recorded music industry amounted to 28.6 billion U.S. dollars. Global streaming revenues reached 19.3 billion U.S. dollars in the same year. Overall, recorded music increased by 10 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. While two thirds of the global music revenue in 2023 came from streaming, making it undoubtedly the backbone of the industry, the physical segment recorded a higher growth rate than streaming compared to the year before. This is based on a resurging interest in CD and vinyl purchases. Smaller regional markets are catching up While the global music market rose by around 10 percent in 2023, this growth rate varied significantly when broken down regionally. Whereas growth in the two biggest regional music markets, North America and Europe, remained in single digits, the music markets in Africa, Latin America, and Asia grew at a fairly higher rate. Sub-Saharan Africa showed the fastest regional growth, at almost 25 percent. At country level, China recorded the highest growth rate within the global top 10 markets, at nearly 26 percent.

In 2024, Meta (formerly Facebook Inc) generated over 160 billion U.S. dollars in ad revenues. Advertising accounts for the vast majority of the social network's revenue. Facebook advertising revenue – additional information Facebook’s business model heavily relies on ads, as the majority of social network’s revenue comes from advertising. In 2020, about 97.9 percent of Facebook's global revenue was generated from advertising, whereas only around two percent was generated by payments and other fees revenue. Facebook ad revenue stood at close to 86 billion U.S. dollars in 2020, a new record for the company and a significant increase in comparison to the previous years. For instance, the social network generated almost seven billion U.S. dollars in ad revenue in 2013, about 10 billion less than the 2015 figure. Facebook's average revenue per user also significantly increased in the same time span, going from 6.81 U.S. dollars in 2013 to 32.03 U.S. dollars in 2020. The U.S. and Canada are important markets for Facebook, considering the average revenue per user (ARPU) in these two countries is far above the global average. Facebook’s ARPU in the U.S. and Canada was 41.41 U.S. dollars in the last quarter of 2019, while the global average was 8.52 U.S. dollars. In Europe, Facebook’s average revenue per user was 13.21 U.S. dollars during the same time period. In terms of segments, mobile is the most promising advertising form for the company. In 2018, Facebook’s mobile advertising revenue already accounted for 92 percent of the social network’s total advertising revenue. Facebook’s mobile advertising revenue grew from an estimate of 13 billion U.S. dollars in 2015 to 50.6 billion U.S. dollars in 2018.

In 2023, Google's ad revenue amounted to 264.59 billion U.S. dollars. The company generates advertising revenue through its Google Ads platform, which enables advertisers to display ads, product listings and service offerings across Google’s extensive ad network (properties, partner sites, and apps) to web users. Google advertising Advertising accounts for the majority of Google’s revenue, which amounted to a total of 305.63 billion U.S. dollars in 2023. The majority of Google's advertising revenue comes from search advertising. Google market share These revenue figures come as no surprise, as Google accounts for the majority of the online and mobile search market worldwide. As of September 2023, Google was responsible for more than 84 percent of global desktop search traffic. The company holds a market share of more than 80 percent in a wide range of digital markets, having little to no domestic competition in many of them. China, Russia, and to a certain extent, Japan, are some of the few notable exceptions, where local products are more preferred.

During the 2023/24 season, the 30 franchises comprising the National Basketball Association (NBA) recorded a total revenue amounting to 11.34 billion U.S. dollars. This was an increase of over 700 million dollars from the previous year. What are the NBA's main sources of revenue? Among the NBA's main sources of income are broadcasting deals, sponsorships, and gate receipts. In particular, the NBA's sponsorship revenue has consistently exceeded one billion U.S. dollars since the 2017/18 season. One of the league's main sponsors since then has been Nike, which is the league's official outfitter. Meanwhile, the share of overall revenue from gate receipts in the NBA was 21.57 percent in 2023/24. Which NBA team generates the most revenue? With a revenue of 800 million U.S. dollars, the Golden State Warriors were the NBA team with the highest revenue in the 2023/24 season. Between 2015 and 2023, the Warriors were a dominant force in the NBA, appearing in six of eight finals and winning four championships, ending their trophy drought stretching back to 1975. However, the Warriors still have some way to go to match the Boston Celtics and the Los Angeles Lakers as the NBA teams with the most championships, with the Celtics winning a record 18th championship title in 2024.