2016Primary sourceWell documented
Streaming Overtakes Physical Sales
On the timeline · around 2016 · The Digital Age
What happened
By 2016, streaming had become the largest source of recorded-music revenue in the United States. According to the Recording Industry Association of America, streaming revenues more than doubled that year, and paid subscriptions alone made up roughly a third of the total, while sales of CDs and downloads kept falling.
Why it matters
The tipping point confirmed that music had become a subscription service rather than a product to own, reversing more than a decade of industry decline and reshaping the economics of the entire business.