Image credit: Fernando @cferdophotography

In a global music industry, who has the biggest influence beyond their borders? The latest data for 2025 reveals all.

Music goes all around the world, crossing borders. All of us can name an artist from another country, but which countries have the biggest musical influence beyond their own borders?

Luminate‘s new Export Power Score reveals the countries who export the most music and who their biggest importers are. So, who would you think has the biggest musical influence in the world? South Korea for their K-Pop? The United Kingdom for their pop artists? Their Q1 2025 list tells us.

At the very top of the list is, perhaps unsurprisingly, the United States. What might be interesting is that Canada is the biggest importer of music from the U.S., followed by Australia and then in third place, the United Kingdom. So, English speaking countries stick together.

This is only reinforced by the United Kingdom in second place for music exports. Their biggest importer is the United States, followed by Ireland and then Australia. Canada rounds of the top 3 music exporters and is similarly beloved most by English-speaking countries: The U.S., U.K., and Australia.

South Korea’s dominance puts them in fourth place, but interestingly despite the huge influence of K-Pop in the West their top importers are all Asian. In order of signficance, South Korea’s biggest music importers are Japan, Taiwan, and Indonesia.

The Luminate Export Power Score is a combination of four data points:

  1. The rank of artists in each country based on Total On-Demand Streaming and Country of Origin
  2. The number of countries importing music from a given export country
  3. The streaming size of importing countries
  4. The number of artists per export country reaching international audiences

Luminate discuss the shifts that their data reveals, writing: “The appearance of countries such as the Philippines, Argentina, and Norway on the top 3 importer lists suggests an increasingly global and multidirectional music economy. For artists, labels, and DSPs, this means more opportunity but also the need for sharper localised marketing strategies.”

Luminate’s Export Power Score was launched in their 2024 Year-End Music Report. This latest update represents data for quarter one 2025.