On Wednesday, Spotify released its Loud & Clear data, taking a deep dive into the mechanisms of the company’s royalty payments and breaking down the global streaming economy.
The report shows that while Australian music industry revenues overall have grown 14.2% since 2018 (according to IFPI), revenues generated by Australian artists – from Spotify alone – grew at 5x that rate, increasing 75% over this same time period.
Spotify’s global reach is over 515m listeners across 184 markets, and in 2022, nearly 80% of Australian artists’ royalties were generated by fans outside of Australia.
Overall, there were 10 main takeaways:
• All-time payouts to music rights holders
are approaching $40 billion
• Spotify pays out nearly 70% of every dollar it generates from music back to the industry
• The number of artists generating $1M+, as well as those generating $10,000+, has more than doubled over the past five years
• For the first year ever, 10,000+ artists generated $100,000+ alone across 100+ different countries
• The 50,000th highest-earning artist generated
$12,500+ from Spotify alone – and likely $50,000
across all recorded revenue sources
• The company paid out more than $3 billion to publishing rights holders over the last two years
• There are around 200,000 professional or professionally aspiring recording acts globally on Spotify, and they generated 95% of the total royalties in 2022
• Over a quarter of all artists who generated over $10,000 self-distribute to Spotify
• Nearly 35% of the artists who generated more than $10,000 live in countries outside the top ten music markets
• In 2022, nearly 3,000 catalogue-heavy artists generated more than $100,000 on Spotify alone
In a media briefing prior to the data being released, Alicia Sbrugnera, head of music at Spotify for Australia & New Zealand, said “When Spotify launched back in 2008, it transformed music listening forever. Our mission now as it was back then, is to give a million creative artists the opportunity to live off of their art, and for billions of fans to have the opportunity to enjoy and be inspired by it. We are well on our way to this goal, and we live by this mission every day in our work here at Spotify.”
On Wednesday, Spotify CEO and founder, Daniel Ek, said that “Markets like Australia are experiencing explosive growth in music streaming revenues. More artists are breaking down geographical barriers and making their local fans proud, while also being discovered by new listeners worldwide.”
See Also: Spotify launches its Make Waves program in Australia with three new podcasts