2024 was a record year for music, thanks to streaming, vinyl and Taylor Swift

UK music sales hit a 20-year high in 2024.

Helped by Taylor Swift’s latest album, streaming and also the increase in popularity of vinyl records, £2.4bn was made from people listening to new music.

Swift’s The Tortured Poets Department was the biggest-selling album of the year, boosted by her record-smashing worldwide Eras tour.

Sabrina Carpenter’s Short N’ Sweet was the third best-selling album, while Billie Eilish was in fifth place.

But what did you listen to in 2024? Let us know in the comments.

Vinyl records which have seen a spike in popularity, were first popular among your grandparents and great grandparents in the mid 20th century, but were later largely replaced by CDs from the late 1980s and 1990s.

However vinyl has seen an increase in sales in recent years with almost £200m spent on vinyl albums in 2024, an increase of more than 10%.

CD sales generated £126.2m – although the format still sells more than vinyl in terms of physical units, with 10.5 million CD albums bought, compared to 6.7m vinyl records sold.

Takings from streaming services including Spotify, YouTube Music, and Amazon rose by 7.8% to a little over £2bn.

Figures from the Digital Entertainment and Retail Association (ERA), said subscriptions to services like Spotify, Amazon Music and Apple Music accounted for almost 85% of the total money spent on music last year.

The figures are being described as good news for the music industry, which has taken years to adapt to the streaming era, and has also faced difficulties with piracy and music available illegally online.

The head of ERA, Kim Bayley said in a statement: “We can now say definitively – music is back!”

However there are still questions over how music artists get paid in the streaming age. According to the Musicians Union, which represents artists, almost half of working musicians in the UK earn less than £14,000 a year.

“Sadly, professional musicians, artists and songwriters are not enjoying the boom represented by these figures,” said the union’s general secretary, Naomi Pohl.