Record labels operate in a recorded-music market increasingly shaped by paid streaming, while physical formats remain commercially important in several countries. Global recorded-music revenue reached US$31.7 billion in 2025, and national markets show very different balances between subscriptions, downloads, CDs, vinyl and other formats.
Contents
- Global market size and format revenue
- Regional growth and market concentration
- United States revenue and streaming mix
- United Kingdom labels, formats and exports
- Australia’s digital and physical market
- Japan’s production and digital sales
Global market size and format revenue
The IFPI’s Global Music Report 2026 measured worldwide recorded-music revenue at US$31.7 billion in 2025. Revenue grew 6.4% during the year, extending global growth to 11 consecutive years. These are global recorded-music revenue measures sourced from record companies, rather than a single country’s retail or wholesale accounting basis. IFPI, Global Music Report 2026
Streaming was the dominant source of that global revenue. It surpassed US$22 billion and represented 69.6% of recorded-music revenue in 2025. Paid subscription streaming alone accounted for 52.4% of global revenue, with 837 million paid subscription accounts worldwide. The distinction matters: “streaming” includes more than paid subscriptions, while the paid-subscription figure isolates the largest subscription segment.
Physical formats also grew globally. Physical-format revenue increased 8.0% in 2025, while vinyl revenue increased 13.7%. Vinyl recorded its 19th consecutive year of growth. Performance-rights revenue reached US$2.9 billion, up 0.3% in 2025. These figures describe separate revenue categories reported by IFPI, so they should not be added together as if they were an independent household spending total.
| Global recorded-music indicator | 2025 result |
|---|---|
| Total recorded-music revenue | US$31.7 billion |
| Year-over-year growth | 6.4% |
| Streaming share | 69.6% |
| Paid subscription share | 52.4% |
| Paid subscription accounts | 837 million |
| Physical-format growth | 8.0% |
| Vinyl growth | 13.7% |
Regional growth and market concentration
The USA-and-Canada region held 38.7% of global recorded-music revenue in 2025 and grew 3.5%. Canada itself grew 5.6%. Europe represented 30.4% of global recorded-music revenue and also grew 5.6% in 2025. Together, these results show the continuing weight of established markets, even as faster-growing regions expanded more quickly. IFPI, Global Music Report 2026
Asia’s recorded-music revenue grew 10.9% in 2025. The region accounted for 45.1% of global physical recorded-music revenue, making it especially significant for label strategies involving CDs, vinyl and other physical products. Latin America recorded the fastest growth among the listed regions, with revenue up 17.1%. Streaming represented 88.1% of Latin America’s recorded-music revenue in 2025.
The regional comparison is not a ranking of total revenue, because the supplied figures combine growth rates, revenue shares and format shares rather than one common currency total for every region. It does show three different market patterns: a large and relatively mature USA-and-Canada region, a substantial European market, and faster growth in Asia and Latin America.
United States revenue and streaming mix
The RIAA reported US recorded-music revenue of US$17.7 billion at estimated retail value in 2024, up 3% year over year. The RIAA’s basis is estimated retail value, so it is not directly interchangeable with wholesale measures reported by other national associations. RIAA, 2024 Year-End Revenue Report
US streaming revenue reached US$14.9 billion in 2024, up 4%, and represented 84% of US recorded-music revenue. Paid-subscription revenue reached US$11.7 billion, up 5%, and made up 79% of streaming revenue. The average number of paid on-demand music subscriptions reached 100 million, up 3% from 2023.
Not every streaming category expanded. Limited-tier subscription revenue fell 2% to US$1.0 billion, while advertising-supported on-demand music revenue also fell 2%, to US$1.8 billion. Digital and customized radio revenue grew 3% to US$1.4 billion. These movements indicate that the US streaming market is internally differentiated: paid subscriptions grew, while two other reported categories declined.
Physical music remained material in the same report. US vinyl revenue grew 7% to US$1.4 billion in 2024. Vinyl therefore grew alongside the much larger streaming business, although the supplied figures do not provide a directly comparable US physical-market total for all formats.
United Kingdom labels, formats and exports
The UK recorded-music market reached £1.49 billion in 2024, an increase of 4.8% year over year. BPI also reported that the market grew by more than 80% over the ten years through 2024. UK streaming revenue reached £1.02 billion and represented 68.1% of recorded-music revenue; streaming revenue grew 5.7% in 2024. BPI, UK Recorded Music Market
Physical formats increased 1.3% to £246.5 million. Within that total, vinyl-LP revenue rose 2.9% to £145.7 million, while CD revenue fell 0.5% to £96.7 million. The format figures show why “physical music” is not synonymous with “CD”: vinyl growth more than offset the reported CD decline within the stated categories, even though the supplied data does not support an unreported calculation of the entire market’s format shares.
Exports add another dimension to the UK label market. UK recorded-music exports reached a record £794.2 million in 2024, up 1.9%. BPI also reported that UK label businesses invested more than £2 billion in artist A&R and marketing between 2020 and 2024. The export total is income from recorded music exports, while the investment figure covers the five-year period; neither should be treated as a single-year profit measure. BPI, UK recorded-music exports
Australia’s digital and physical market
ARIA reported Australian wholesale recorded-music sales of A$717 million in 2024, up 6.1% year over year. This is a net wholesale-sales measure, so its accounting basis differs from the RIAA’s estimated retail value and from the global IFPI measure. ARIA, Recorded music continues to grow in Australia
Digital recorded music reached A$656 million and represented 91.5% of Australia’s total market. Subscription services generated A$509 million, equivalent to 71.0% of the total music market. Digital sales grew 6.5% in 2024, while physical sales grew 2.1%.
Vinyl was the standout physical format in the supplied Australian figures. Vinyl revenue grew 5.6% in 2024. It represented 72.8% of physical recorded-music sales by dollar value and 45.7% by volume. The difference between those two percentages is important: vinyl’s share of physical revenue was higher than its share of physical units, but the data does not provide enough detail to infer an average price for a vinyl unit.
Japan’s production and digital sales
Japan’s 2024 figures combine production and sales measures. Physical recorded-music production reached 141.37 million units, down 11% year over year, and its production value was ¥205.2 billion, down 7%. Digital-music sales reached ¥123.3 billion, up 6%. Combined physical-production value and digital-music sales totaled ¥328.5 billion, down 3% year over year. RIAJ, Overview of Recorded Music in 2024
The combined result masks different format directions. Japanese audio-recording production totaled 108.15 million units, down 3%, but audio-recording production value reached ¥149.0 billion, up 2%. CD-album production fell 12% to 62.52 million units, while CD-single production rose 12% to 41.98 million units.
Vinyl production expanded from a smaller base. Japanese vinyl-disc production rose 17% to 3.15 million units, and vinyl-disc production value rose 26% to ¥7.9 billion. The unit and value measures refer to production, not consumer retail revenue, so they should not be compared as though they described the same stage of the market as US retail or Australian wholesale sales.
Japan’s figures are therefore best read as a transition across formats: physical production declined overall, digital sales increased, CD albums weakened, CD singles grew, and vinyl posted double-digit production growth. The supplied report does not establish that these movements apply uniformly to every Japanese label, artist or release.