UK listeners spent over £2 billion on music streaming services in 2025
UK listeners spent £2.045 billion on music streaming services in 2025. This represents a 3.2% increase on the previous year, according to the Entertainment Retailers Association (ERA).
Although revenue across all platforms hit an all-time-high, there has been some slowdown in growth compared with 2024, which saw a 5.9% boost. However, as Music Week reports, these numbers may be slightly skewed due to the timing of subscription price increases.
Physical music sales were up, too, with an overall rise of 11.5%, to £368.1 million. Vinyl was a key driver, with sales climbing by 18.5%. However, cassettes claimed the biggest increase, rocketing by 95% to bring in £4.6 million, while CDs fell by 1%, accounting for just £125 million. Digital downloads also slipped, for a third year running, declining 3.5% against 2024.
When looking across the past decade, combined revenue from recorded music in the UK has grown by 124% since 2016. Only video games claim a bigger increase. Meanwhile, Britain’s GDP has expanded by just 12% during the same period.
The country’s best selling album of 2025 was Life of a Showgirl by Taylor Swift, which shifted 642,469 units, including more than 147,000 on 12″. Alex Warren’s Ordinary was the top single, with the equivalent of 2.18 million sales.
“Streaming services in the UK fund around 60 different programmes supporting music, with a third of them focusing on new and emerging UK talent,” said ERA CEO Kim Bayley.
“Record shops too are playing their part, promoting more than 4,000 instore and outstore performances a year, the majority of them featuring UK artists,” she continued. “Streaming services and retailers are committed to supporting new UK music and the emergence of a new wave of UK artists is vindicating their approach.”
