CD Sales Down 41%, Overall Music Revenue Up 9.5% in First Half of 2018

The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has released its revenue report for the first half of 2018, and the trends we saw develop in 2017 have continued into this year.

CD sales are down, way down, dropping 41% as compared to the same period in 2017. Vinyl sales are up a tick (13%), but that increase wasn’t enough to offset an overall decline in physical media. Digital downloads were also down, but streaming revenue jumped 33% half year over half year and now accounts for 75% of all recorded music revenue, most of it from paid subscriptions. The net result is that overall revenue from recorded music in the U.S. rose to $4.6 billion, a 9.5% jump over 2017’s $4.2 billion first half tally.

The upshot: the overall music industry is quite healthy. While CDs and digital downloads are going the way of the dodo bird, the public is finally embracing streaming services en masse.

You can read the full report, along with some nifty charts, right here.

[via The PRP]