Streaming Rapid Rise to Mass Adoption

Thanks to continuing growth in streaming subscriptions, global music industry revenues grew by 10 percent in 2023. According to the IFPI’s latest Global Music Report, 2023 marked the ninth consecutive year of growth for the music industry that had previously struggled with declining revenues for 15 years.

Streaming accounted for 67 percent of global recorded music revenues last year, as the number of users of paid streaming subscriptions offered by Spotify and other platforms continued to soar, although growth rates weren't as high as in the previous years. In 2023, paid streaming services added 78 million new users, bringing the total number of users to 667 million 15 years after the European launch of Spotify rang in the the streaming era.

As the following chart shows, streaming subscriptions have grown relentlessly over the past decade. Starting out at 8 million in 2010, the number of users of paid music subscriptions passed 100 million in 2016, 250 million in 2018 and 500 million in 2021. At the current growth rate, it will take a couple of years before music streaming services reach one billion user, but the fact that that milestone seems reachable speaks for itself.

All statements in this article attributable to IFPI represent Statista’s interpretation of data, research opinion or viewpoints published as part of the IFPI Global Music Report in March 2024, and have not been reviewed by IFPI. Each IFPI publication speaks as of its original publication date (and not as of the date of this article’s publication).