Music Publishing Market Size

Global Music Publishing Market size was valued at USD 6.7 billion in 2023 and is poised to grow from USD 7.18 billion in 2024 to USD 12.53 billion by 2032, growing at a CAGR of 7.2% during the forecast period (2025-2032). 

The global music publishing market growth is increasing at a robust pace, and this is due to the surging popularity of digital streaming services along with the increased consumption of music on an international scale. Further, it is amplified by investment in artist development and diversified income streams from synchronization and performance rights.

Several growth and innovation opportunities in music publishing have arisen from emerging technologies, shifts in consumer behavior, and global markets expansion. But perhaps among all the promising chances, nothing is more phenomenal than the constant rise of digital platforms and streaming services that greatly changed music consumption and distribution on a global level. Many consumers are streaming more online music; publishers can capitalize on this emerging trend by licensing their catalogues to the platforms, hence earning royalties from content streaming. Moreover, advances in technologies such as AI and machine learning are changing the business as they present new ways of finding, creating, and making money from music. These help publishers track behavior, discover trends in the making, and control their exposure so that they can monetize the best possible pieces in their catalogues. AI-driven algorithms for music recommendation and personalized playlists foster more listening.

Global expansion of the music industry has brought new markets and revenue sources to publishers. There is massive, untapped potential in music consumption and licensing opportunities in Asia, Latin America, and Africa. Fast urbanization and rollout of digital infrastructure in these regions all fuel demand for music on different platforms-from film and television commercials to video games and live entertainment. Fast urbanization and the rollout of digital infrastructure in these regions all fuel demand for music on different platforms-from film and television commercials to video games and live entertainment. International collaborations and cross-cultural musical influences are going to continue growing; therefore, this is bound to benefit the global music publishing industry with a much more diversified and expansive audience base. The combined factors will help propel industry growth in the coming years.

Key Market Attributes

Universal Music Group, UMG, announced at the beginning of January 2025, a multi-year agreement related to recorded music and music publishing with Spotify, as part of this strategic new deal, improving opportunities for the artists, the songwriters and consumers through innovational subscription layers, bundling music with content and expanding their audio-visual catalog. According to Spotify CEO Daniel Ek, the deal is supposed to encourage creative development, thereby making premium content more accessible while taking the subscription for global music coverage to a new level. This deal, by leveraging on UMG's vast library and Spotify's top-end technology, aims to make the streaming market stronger while producing opportunities for monetization from creators.

BMG Rights Management agreed to a strategic partnership with Universal Music Group in October 2024 in which it transferred physical distribution to the UMG Commercial Services division. The company will retain control of its own digital catalogue while using the extensive network for physical distribution that UMG has to offer. By the time BMG is making its full structural change in October 2024, it will fully optimize its entire business across all formats, be it vinyl or CDs and others. It wants to build a stronger strength of distribution over its whole music catalog, hence more accessible and therefore potentially strengthened in the ever-changing music landscape, taking the help of UMG's global infrastructure and expertise.

Sony Music reported revenue that was way above expectations for the quarter through October 2023. Its major revenue source has been a growing stream of income from the rising consumption of music through online streaming platforms, further reflecting an overall industry trend toward digital sales. Increased interest in other genres, such as EDM, also fuels the demand for digital publishing. The increase in popularity for these genres will lead more music publishers to concentrate on building digital channels and establishing strategic partnerships in order to achieve maximum revenue-generating potential. With the utilization of streaming, digital rights management, and AI-driven music discovery, growth within the industry will be stable within the digital world.