Spotify, Apple boost music business to best year in two decades

Spot on: Over the last 12 months, Malaysians have streamed at least 7.5 billion minutes worth of music on Spotify.

THE growing popularity of Spotify and Apple Music is nursing the music industry back to health after years of declining sales.

In 2016, US music sales grew 11% to US$7.7bil, the Recording Industry Association of America says. That’s the biggest jump since 1998, when the industry sold almost six times as many CDs. Streaming, a category that includes Spotify, Pandora and YouTube, accounted for 51%, the first time it has contributed the majority of revenue.