The America Recording Industry Association has recently reported that Apple Music, Spotify and other music streaming platforms have a commanding share of the total music industry in the US for the first half of 2019.
Revenue is up 26% from last year at an approximate $4.3 billion, with segments coming from subscription-based models such as Apple Music and radio services SiriusXM and Pandora as well as YouTube.
Subscription-based models are the highest income earners, collectively at $3.3 billion. In the paid streaming category, the reports have included Limited Tier models such as the one Pandora Plus and Amazon Prime have, accounting for $482 million.
The surge is attributed to new users that averaged a million a month in the past 12 months and in the paid subscription increase up 30%, or equal to 61.1 million new users.
Apple Music is keeping pace with Spotify, currently the market leader with 232 millions users spread out on the free-to-listen and paid tiers.