RIAA Mid-Year: Revenue Hits $4.6 Billion as Paid Streaming Subscribers Rise 47 Percent Across U.S. Music IndustryHighlights:
- U.S. revenue expanding to $4.6 billion in the first half of the year, a 10 percent increase over the $4.18 billion recorded in the corresponding six months of 2017
- streaming is driving the growth with revenue increasing to $3.35 billion, up 28.4 percent from the $2.83 million generated in the first half of 2017.
-- paid subscriptions grew to $2.55 billion, up from $1.91 billion, or a 33.3 percent increase
-- paid subscribers totaled 46.3 million subscriptions, a nearly 15 million increase, or 47.4 percent, from the 31.5 million subscribers counted at the mid-year point in 2017.
--ad-supported revenue nearly $498 million, a 15.6 percent increase over the $430.6 million paid out to labels and artists by services last year.
- digital download sales revenue fell 26.5 percent to $562.2 million from nearly $767 million.
- physical media sales, revenue fell 24.9 percent to $461.6 million from $615 million garnered in the first six months of 2017.
-- CD sales fell precipitously to $245.9 million from $420 million, a 41.5 percent drop as the unit count fell to 18.6 million units, or nearly half of the 35 million units shipped in 2017.
-- Vinyl LPs increased by nearly a million units to 8.1 million for total revenue of $198.6 million, up about 12.7 percent from the $176.1 million garnered in 2017 when the unit count was 7.2 million units.
