German Music Industry Experiences 2025 Growth Slowdown

A breakdown of the German music market’s 2025 revenue by format. Photo Credit: Bundesverband Musikindustrie (BVMI)

Due to modest streaming gains and an almost 6% year-over-year (YoY) physical slip, the German market experienced a recorded music sales slowdown during 2025.

Those and other details come from BVMI’s latest annual report, which shed light on $2.83 billion/€2.42 billion in overall recorded music sales for the European nation last year. “[I]ndustry revenues from these sales amounted to €1.33 billion [$1.56 billion],” the organization noted.

All told, the sales sum represents a 2.3% YoY uptick and, in turn, the German market’s slowest annual expansion in several years.

(Technically, Germany’s recorded revenue decreased in both 2017 and 2018, though the latter marked the first year in which BVMI stopped including audiobook sales in its data.)

Behind the 2025 figure, streaming propelled digital to $2.43 billion/€2.08 billion, for a 3.8% YoY boost. Across the board, on-demand listening specifically made up 84.4% of revenue compared to 1.4% for permanent downloads.

Worth bearing in mind, however, is that Spotify implemented double-digit price increases in Germany this past August.

In any event, things were less positive on the physical side, where 2.8% YoY vinyl growth was unable to offset an 11.3% YoY dip for CDs. With CDs still accounting for 56% of total physical revenue, that came out to a 5.9% YoY decline, to $403 million/€345 million, for the category.

Germany’s physical sales have now fallen each year since at least 2016, the lone exception being a €1 million bump across 2022 and 2023. Furthermore, the 2025 total reflects a 65% contraction from 2016.

Additionally, sync kicked in $14 million/€12 million (up 7.2% YoY) against $286 million/€245 million (down 5.1%) from neighbouring rights.

(Another pertinent parenthetical: 2025’s final neighbouring rights tally isn’t yet available, so BVMI estimated the figure. “Compared to the previous year, 2024, a decline in revenue is assumed, which is attributable to a one-time additional payment received in the previous year from private copying,” the entity explained.)

Addressing the results, BVMI board chair Florian Drücke described the present as “a very challenging phase” amid AI’s expansion.

“The music market continues to develop and change rapidly,” Drücke said. “Our industry is highly dynamic in the area of ​​innovative partnerships, and revenue growth in Germany is solid in a highly competitive environment. Given the increasing penetration of AI across all industry segments, we are particularly interested in expanding the digital licensing business, based on strong copyright law that must not be diluted. As a music industry, we are in a very challenging phase, in which our members play a central role.”

In the bigger picture, Germany certainly isn’t the only developed market that’s experiencing a slowdown. The same is true for different European countries as well as the U.S., where the RIAA pointed to less than 1% YoY revenue growth for H1 2025.

On the other hand, emerging music sectors in Brazil (21.7% YoY), Mexico (15.6%), South Africa (14.4%), and China (9.6%) all achieved substantial recorded revenue improvements during 2024, according to IFPI data.