The sale of Physical music is on course to have its first increase in 20 years. According to Music Week, figures taken from the Official Charts Company and BPI showed that physical album sales have increased 3.2% in the first 6 months of 2024 with 8,044,760 units being sold. As well as this the figures show that physical album sales also have increasing momentum with sales rising 3.9% in the second quarter of the year.
At the same time last year physical album sales growth was negative at -0.3% and the whole of 2023 saw sales down 1.1% overall. If growth of physical records remains positive this year it will mean that 2024 will be the first year physical music sales have increased since 2004 when we saw a huge shift towards digital music and streaming. 2004 saw 163.4 million units being sold, showing how this trend towards streaming and digital music over the last two decades has affected physical music sales.
The overall consumption of music based on Album Equivalent Sales which combines all physical, digital and streaming, saw an increase of 9.8% in the first six months of the year rising to 98,548,427 units. Consumption of streaming equivalent albums alone increased by 11% to 87,974,752 units showing how streaming is still dominant within the market.
The vinyl boom of recent years has not yet been enough to drag the sales of physical albums into positive growth as the sale of CDs, which is still the dominant format in terms of units, has been seeing huge declines. However, this is on course to change in 2024 and this could be as a result of the emergence of vinyl collectors as well as initiatives such as Record Store Day, HMV Vinyl Week and National Album Day.
According to the half year figures Taylor Swift’s ‘The Tortured Poets Department’ leads the way in physical sales so far this year with 254,241 units sold which has been a significant contribution to the increased physical album sales. As well as this, the other albums to make up the top 5 of physical album sales were ‘Swing Fever’ by Rod Stewart & Jools Holland with 48,540 sales, Liam Gallagher & John Squire’s self-titled album with 46,982, Billie Eilish’s ‘Hit Me Hard And Soft’ with 45, 434 sales and The Last Dinner Party’s debut album ‘Prelude To Ecstasy’ with 42,352.
Vinyl was the driving force in the increase of physical sales in the first six months with sales of vinyl albums increasing 12.4% to 3,052,498 units. The growth of vinyl sales was up 13.3% in the second quarter of the year. CD sales were down 1.5% to 4,911,845 units in the first half of the year which, although shows a decline in sales, it actually marks a significant slowing of the decline of CD sales compared to recent years which has contributed to physical sales overall growth in the first six months of 2024. This could also potentially mean that there will be a CD revival as the decline in sales was even slower in the second quarter of the year at just 0.8%.
The growing interest in copies of physical music is also shown in the figures for the sales of singles with seven-inch vinyl sales being at their highest point in 15 years.
