UK music revenues highest in over two decades thanks to streaming following a 7% increase in overall entertainment sales to £119 Bn in 2023, according to preliminary figures released by digital entertainment and retail association ERA.
The main driver of growth in 2023 was streaming and digital services which increased revenues by more than £800m in a year and now account for 91.7% of total revenue. It means the entertainment market has grown by just over 50% since the last pre-pandemic year of 2019, led by video (up 88.3%), followed by music (+38.8%) and games (+29.2%). Bucking the declining trend in physical formats, the value of vinyl LP sales increased by 18% and CDs achieved its first value increase in 20 years (+2%).
The fastest growing sector in 2023 was video, up 10% to £4,915m, followed by music, up 9.6% to £2,220m and games up 2.9% to £4,737m. Driven by subscription services such as Netflix, Amazon Prime Video and Apple TV, video recaptured its historic position as entertainment’s largest sector, ending a 10 year run of dominance by games. Meanwhile thanks to streaming services from Spotify, Amazon, YouTube and Apple, music revenues were their highest since 2002 – and just 0.08% below music’s all time high of 2001. Games sales grew by a modest 2.9% in 2023 to £4,736.7m but have now doubled in value over the past decade.
| UK Entertainment Sales in 2023 (£m) | ||||
| 2022 | 2023 | % change vs 2022 | ||
| Music | Physical | £280.4 | £311.0 | 10.9% |
| Downloads | £45.4 | £42.7 | -5.9% | |
| Streaming | £1,699.1 | £1,866.2 | 9.8% | |
| Total Music | £2,024.9 | £2,219.9 | 9.6% | |
| Video | Physical Retail | £209.0 | £169.7 | -18.8% |
| Physical Rental | £9.9 | £5.6 | -43.7% | |
| Digital | £4,248.4 | £4,739.7 | 11.6% | |
| Total Video | £4,467.3 | £4,915.1 | 10.0% | |
| Games | Physical | £517.9 | £495.0 | -4.4% |
| Digital | £4,086.5 | £4,241.8 | 3.8% | |
| Total Games | £4,604.3 | £4,736.7 | 2.9% | |
| Total Entertainment | Physical | £1,017.2 | £981.3 | -3.5% |
| Digital (inc streaming) | £10,079.3 | £10,890.4 | 8.0% | |
| Total Entertainment | £11,096.5 | £11,871.7 | 7.0% | |
| How Entertainment flourished through pandemic and recession | |||
| 2019 | 2023 | % change | |
| Video | £2,610.6m | £4,915.1m | +88.3% |
| Games | £3,666.2m | £4,736.7m | +29.2% |
| Music | £1,599.4m | £2,219.9m | +38.8% |
| Home entertainment | £7,876.2m | £11,871.7m | +50.7% |
UK Music Sales in 2023
UK spending on music streaming subscriptions, vinyl and CDs grew by 9.6% in 2023, nearly twice as fast as 2022 (+5%). The £2,219.9m total was the highest since 2001, the historic peak of the CD era, and just 0.08% shy of that record. It was more than double the level of 2013 when music sales plummeted in the face of internet piracy. Once again, the main driver of growth came from streaming services such as Spotify, YouTube, Amazon and Apple, which grew subscription streaming revenues by 9.8% to £1,866.2m, another all-time-high.
Physical sales grew by an impressive 10.9% to £311m, a significant improvement on 2022’s 4% decline. Vinyl album sales grew by 17.8% to reach £177.3m, while CD recorded its first rise in sales value for two decades, up 2% to reach £126.2m. The strength of physical sales was all the more remarkable given significant distribution problems which affected much of the industry in late summer 2023.
The biggest album of the year was The Weeknd’s The Highlights, while the best-performing track was Miley Cyrus’s ‘Flowers’.
Further details on Video and Games sales can be found here.
