Newly released vinyl sales data is raising questions about a possible plateau. Photo Credit: Myko Makhlai
We’ve been hearing about the streaming plateau for some time. But after nearly two decades of consecutive growth for vinyl, is the format facing a slowdown of its own?
The question is front of mind following yesterday’s release of new recorded-market details for the U.S. According to those RIAA-provided stats, vinyl sales revenue grew for the 18th consecutive year in 2024 – though units shipped increased only 1% from 2023 to 43.6 million.
On one hand, in an age when a month of ad-free streaming costs less than a single LP in the States, that’s an impressive feat. On the other hand – and despite 2024’s $1.44 billion (up 6.9% YoY) in U.S. vinyl revenue at estimated retail value – the figure suggests a commercial slowdown for vinyl in today’s largest music market.
Nevertheless, the same figure might not be indicative of materially slipping fan demand or a significant loss of ground for the resurging format.
Of course, vinyl’s 1% YoY sales-volume growth is noticeably smaller than the increases attributable to recent years – with the nearest exception being 2016 and its 1.8% YoY boost. But it’s easy to forget that vinyl’s U.S. units shipped hiked 158% between 2015 and 2024.
Furthermore, against the backdrop of heightened demand from Swifties and other artist-specific superfans, much of the spike is new. Per RIAA data, U.S. vinyl sales jumped by a massive 67.3% between 2020 (23.7 million) and 2021 (39.7 million) alone – and that was following 23.6% growth across 2019 and 2020.
(Like with streaming’s measurement metrics, methodology changes make it difficult to illustrate exactly how U.S. vinyl sales stack up on a year-to-year basis, at least for lengthier stretches. One such change, for example, saw the RIAA adjust LP/EP units moved from 17.2 million as initially reported in 2016 to 14.8 million when reiterated in the 2017 report.)
Stated differently, given that 2024’s U.S. vinyl sales were still almost 2.3 times greater than 2019’s, it’s noteworthy that the format’s consecutive-growth streak is unbroken.
And we aren’t without other evidence of possible vinyl-growth hiccups. Whether the result of its much-discussed sales-calculation changes, a genuine decline, or both, Luminate identified a substantial 2024 drop for physical in the U.S.
As for what this information means from a global perspective, the IFPI today pointed to 4.6% global revenue (not sales volume) growth for vinyl during 2024. In keeping with the figure, vinyl achieved mixed results on a country-by-country basis last year.
That includes but certainly isn’t limited to the U.K. (2.9% YoY vinyl-revenue growth to $189 million), Spain (down 3.8% YoY to $36 million), and Italy (6.8% growth to $42 million).
Content shared from www.digitalmusicnews.com.