A recent report from data analysts Kantar Worldpanel has revealed that Amazon Prime Music is the second most popular streaming service in the UK, surpassing Apple Music for the first time.
The report measured active users of each streaming service to find which company, overall, was the most popular with UK music fans.
Taking the number one spot was Spotify which has long been the streaming service of choice in the UK, with around one in 10 British adults actively using the service throughout June – an all time high for the company.
Streaming services themselves do not release user figures for specific markets, preferring to publish global figures instead.
Kantar Worldpanel gathered their information from their Retail Barometer survey, which involved interviewing 15,000 British consumers and determining each services’ users count through tailored questionnaires.
Their findings revealed that Amazon Prime Music experienced a 3.8 percent market penetration in June, up 2.09 percent from the same period in 2017.
Apple Music was found to have had a market penetration of 2.9 percent, while Spotify boasted a market penetration of 11 percent, a ten percent rise since the same period in 2017.
Ten percent of Spotify’s users are said to be between the ages of 55 – 64, suggesting the company has the potential to expand into older demographics who have typically been reluctant to adopt streaming services in the past.
Active users for each service are defined as users who have accessed a platform and streamed music within a four-week period leading to the survey.
The figures suggest rapid progress is being made by Amazon in breaking into the music streaming market, something that is said to have been assisted by the success of their voice-controlled Amazon Echo devices.
Amazon Prime users are also automatically granted access to Amazon Prime Music, which offers users a catalogue of two million songs to stream.
This means that as the number of Prime users rises, as will the companies share in the streaming market.
Companies, however, may see their market share fall in the coming months as YouTube's newly launched streaming service YouTube Music hits the UK streaming landscape and starts to gather new users.
Kantar Worldpanel analyst Giulia Barresi said: ‘Consumers have more choice than ever when it comes to where they stream entertainment online, which means services need to do more to attract users. Amazon is doing this well – its offer of free music with Prime delivery has helped the platform double its number of active users since last year, surpassing Apple Music subscriber figures for the first time.’
It was also revealed in the study that HMV has experienced a growth in it’s share of the physical music market to 22.8 percent, despite a reduction in the overall sales of physical music by 5.8 percent and a resulting loss of £7m in value.
Barresi went on to say: ‘Many retailers are reducing their floorspace and this can mean shoppers are given fewer opportunities to make spur of the moment purchases, such as at the till. As High Street stores change their look and feel in response to pressures from their online rivals, retailers need to ensure they are maintaining and creating environments that support spontaneous purchase if they are to turn the table on falling sales.’
A separate study into music consumption suggests that the rise in popularity of streaming services has started to curtail the practice of illegally downloading music in the UK.
Photo: Bruce Mars.
The report measured active users of each streaming service to find which company, overall, was the most popular with UK music fans.
Taking the number one spot was Spotify which has long been the streaming service of choice in the UK, with around one in 10 British adults actively using the service throughout June – an all time high for the company.
Streaming services themselves do not release user figures for specific markets, preferring to publish global figures instead.
Kantar Worldpanel gathered their information from their Retail Barometer survey, which involved interviewing 15,000 British consumers and determining each services’ users count through tailored questionnaires.
Their findings revealed that Amazon Prime Music experienced a 3.8 percent market penetration in June, up 2.09 percent from the same period in 2017.
Apple Music was found to have had a market penetration of 2.9 percent, while Spotify boasted a market penetration of 11 percent, a ten percent rise since the same period in 2017.
Ten percent of Spotify’s users are said to be between the ages of 55 – 64, suggesting the company has the potential to expand into older demographics who have typically been reluctant to adopt streaming services in the past.
Active users for each service are defined as users who have accessed a platform and streamed music within a four-week period leading to the survey.
The figures suggest rapid progress is being made by Amazon in breaking into the music streaming market, something that is said to have been assisted by the success of their voice-controlled Amazon Echo devices.
Amazon Prime users are also automatically granted access to Amazon Prime Music, which offers users a catalogue of two million songs to stream.
This means that as the number of Prime users rises, as will the companies share in the streaming market.
Companies, however, may see their market share fall in the coming months as YouTube's newly launched streaming service YouTube Music hits the UK streaming landscape and starts to gather new users.
Kantar Worldpanel analyst Giulia Barresi said: ‘Consumers have more choice than ever when it comes to where they stream entertainment online, which means services need to do more to attract users. Amazon is doing this well – its offer of free music with Prime delivery has helped the platform double its number of active users since last year, surpassing Apple Music subscriber figures for the first time.’
It was also revealed in the study that HMV has experienced a growth in it’s share of the physical music market to 22.8 percent, despite a reduction in the overall sales of physical music by 5.8 percent and a resulting loss of £7m in value.
Barresi went on to say: ‘Many retailers are reducing their floorspace and this can mean shoppers are given fewer opportunities to make spur of the moment purchases, such as at the till. As High Street stores change their look and feel in response to pressures from their online rivals, retailers need to ensure they are maintaining and creating environments that support spontaneous purchase if they are to turn the table on falling sales.’
A separate study into music consumption suggests that the rise in popularity of streaming services has started to curtail the practice of illegally downloading music in the UK.
Photo: Bruce Mars.
