With AI on the rise, fears of a streaming ceiling, and the rise of the East, what’s going to happen to the music industry in the coming years?

Predicting the future is a brave task. Yet each year, MIDiA releases their predictions for where the music industry is going. Based on their music industry expertise and a comprehensive view of where the industry is at and recent growth, they’re often confidently accurate.

The headline from MIDiA’s predictions is that they expect global recorded music revenues to reach $110.8 billion in 2032. That’s a huge growth that is almost double the latest recorded revenues for 2024, which stood at $64.8 globally.

Their figure includes revenues from streaming, downloads, physical music, performance, and sync. It also includes streaming from apps like TikTok, expanded rights, and some more. They explain that this is the “maximalist view”.

In a minimalist view, label revenues and labels’ share of live, merchandise, branding, and so on, 2032 sees revenues reach $51.2 billion. This means that a massive, more than 50% share of music revenues, comes from independent artists and alternative sources of music revenue.

MIDiA note that that global revenues slowed in 2024 after a booming 2023. They write: “The years with weaker growth coincided with declines in physical and (most often) weaker streaming growth. While this gives physical a kingmaker status, it also reflects maturing streaming growth.”

MIDiA discuss that there will be 4 major shifts for the music industry affecting growth and direction:

A move away from the west: Last year, almost 80% of subscriber growth in streaming came from non-Western markets. China became the world’s fourth largest recorded music market. Performing rights revenues are also booming in growth in the East as country’s which before might not have earned them are beginning to collect them.

Digital Streaming Providers power shifts: Recent years have seen a lot of discussion over streaming services’ bundling licensing discounts. Labels have seen a move towards ‘artist centric’ licensing too. The dynamics of power and revenue are changing.

Ad-supported streaming flattens out: Ad-supported revenues were reportedly flat in 2024. MIDiA point to videos being monetised more by YouTube Premium’s ad-free, subscription source of revenue. They also point to advertisers moving to podcasting for funding rather than music, claiming better results from this media.

The inevitability of AI: Generative AI is producing ever more convincing music and this music is beginning to flood streaming services. There are many ethical questions over AI music creation. Here the issue is that streaming of AI music may take revenue from human artists.

You can find MIDiA’s full report, detailing their predictions for the music industry between 2025 and 2032, here.