The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has published the annual music sales of the year 2022. For the first time in the last 35 years, since 1987, the vinylsthe classics music discsThey have sold more units that the Music CDwhich is its digital equivalent.
In previous years, vinyl had already brought in more money, but in 2022 for the first time they also surpass music cd in number of units sold.
Go ahead than the streaming music continues to be the great dominator. In 2022 increased its revenue by 7%, reaching $13.3 billion, only in the United States. That supposes 84% of the market.
Vinyl will surpass CD in 2022
But the physical music (vinyl, CD, DVD, blu-ray, etc.) continues to recover the market, and already adds eleven% of all revenue from the music industry. It grows at the expense of downloadable musicthat drops to 3%. He 2% what is missing corresponds to the music broadcast on the radio.
The sales in physical format increased by 4% in 2022, until reaching the 1.7 billion dollars.
But the biggest rush was experienced by the vinyls. They suppose the 71% of sales in physical formatwith a 17% growth. add up to 16 years growing steadily.
As we mentioned in the headline, for the first time vinyl outperforms cds in number of units sold. were sold 41 million vinyls only in the United States, compared to the 31 million of CDs.
the artist who more vinyl has sold is Taylor Swiftwith 1.7 million units. He is followed by Harry Styles and… The Beatles.
The reasons for vinyl revival they are varied. Many audiophiles claim that analog music has more nuancesalthough technically the same can be achieved with digital music… if the encoding is good.
The problem is that much of the streaming music It is low quality. Spotify, for example, hasn’t even made the leap to hi-res.
The interesting thing here is that vinyls are also beginning to interest young peoplewho appreciated being able to “play” the music with their hands, and the artistic design of the cases, according to VPM.
Is good know that there is still room for physical formatsAt least in the world of music. I wish the same thing happened with TV series…
The vinyls surpass for the first time CD in unit sales in 2022and that raises an interesting dilemma: digital or analog music?
