What you need to know
- Apple Music commands the second-highest market share in music streaming services.
- It still sits far back from Spotify and its 31% market share dominance.
Apple Music is the second-most popular music streaming service in the world, but it still has a long way to do to try and catch up to Spotify.
According to a new report from Midia Research, Apple Music grabbed a 15% market share in the second quarter of 2021. While this put the streaming service in second place, it is still far behind Spotify which still commands a 31% market share globally.
Spotify remains the DSP with the highest market share (31%), but this was down from 33% in Q2 2020 and 34% in Q2 2019. With Apple Music being a distant second with 15% market share, and Spotify adding more subscribers in the 12 months leading up to Q2 2021 than any other single DSP, there is no risk of Spotify losing its leading position anytime soon – but the erosion of its share is steady and persistent.
When the report looked at the remaining competitors, it found that YouTube Music has actually garnered quite a following with Gen Z and younger Millennials.
Amazon Music once again out-performed Spotify in terms of growth (25% compared to 20%), but the standout success story among Western DSPs was YouTube Music, for the second successive year. Google was once the laggard of the space, but the launch of YouTube Music has transformed its fortunes, growing by more than 50% in the 12 months leading up to Q2 2021. YouTube Music was the only Western DSP to increase global market share during this the period. YouTube Music particularly resonates among Gen Z and younger Millennials, which should have alarm bells ringing for Spotify, as their core base of Millennial subscribers from the 2010s in the West are now beginning to age.
Apple's music streaming service has been making some moves to differentiate itself from the other music streaming services. Last year, the company released support for Spatial Audio with Dolby Atmos and Lossless Audio for no additional cost for subscribers.
Apple Music is available for $9.99 per month or $4.99 per month for students. It is also available as part of each tier in the company's Apple One subscription bundle service.
