Apple
Apple’s iTunes captures 69 percent of digital music sold
By Jim DalrympleAugust 18, 2009, 6:44 am PT
According to a new report from market research firm NPD, Apple’s iTunes Store leads all digital retailers in music sales, capturing 69 percent of the market.
Looking strictly at the digital music market, Apple’s iTunes captured 69 percent of the market in the first half of 2009. Amazon came in second place with eight percent of the market.
Looking all music sold, Apple continues to lead with 25 percent of the market. Apple’s market share is based on unit volumes of music sold at retail and includes both physical CDs and paid digital downloads. In 2007 Apple’s overall market share for music sold was 14 percent and in 2008 it was 21 percent.
Russ Crupnick, vice president of entertainment industry analysis, said digital music sales will equal that of the physical CD by the end of 2010.
“The growth of legal digital music downloads, and Apple’s success in holding that market, has increased iTunes’s overall strength in the retail music category,” said Crupnick. “But the importance of the big box retailers shouldn’t be dismissed, as long as the majority of music consumers continue to buy CDs.”
Please take a minute to Tweet, Like, or Share this post with your friends.
TweetShare
Email This Post
⋅ 
Print This Post
⋅ Post a comment
Discussion
6 comments so far
6 Responses to “Apple’s iTunes captures 69 percent of digital music sold”
Leave a Reply
Apple’s iTunes captures 69 percent of digital music sold
By Jim DalrympleAugust 18, 2009, 6:44 am PT
According to a new report from market research firm NPD, Apple’s iTunes Store leads all digital retailers in music sales, capturing 69 percent of the market.
Looking strictly at the digital music market, Apple’s iTunes captured 69 percent of the market in the first half of 2009. Amazon came in second place with eight percent of the market.
Looking all music sold, Apple continues to lead with 25 percent of the market. Apple’s market share is based on unit volumes of music sold at retail and includes both physical CDs and paid digital downloads. In 2007 Apple’s overall market share for music sold was 14 percent and in 2008 it was 21 percent.
Russ Crupnick, vice president of entertainment industry analysis, said digital music sales will equal that of the physical CD by the end of 2010.
“The growth of legal digital music downloads, and Apple’s success in holding that market, has increased iTunes’s overall strength in the retail music category,” said Crupnick. “But the importance of the big box retailers shouldn’t be dismissed, as long as the majority of music consumers continue to buy CDs.”
Please take a minute to Tweet, Like, or Share this post with your friends.
TweetShare
Email This Post
⋅ Print This Post
⋅ Post a comment
Discussion 6 comments so far
6 Responses to “Apple’s iTunes captures 69 percent of digital music sold”
Leave a Reply
It’s a shame that even though Apple holds such a large market share, it doesn’t make any money from music directly. iTunes Store only use is to drive hardware sales. I wonder if it’s working that well since dedicated iPod sales are slipping. Although that may be due to the economy in general. We’ll see in another year how iPod sales continue to fare.
iPod sales are "slipping", but it's not just iPods. It's ALL MP3 players in general. One reason is largely because the market is already saturated. Everybody and your grandma already has an iPod or some kind of MP3 player. The market is saturated, so there is less and less demand for them. Another reason is because (and this is a far bigger reason) that "smartphones" such as Blackberries and iPhones pretty much cannibalize the music-player market, because ALL smartphones such as iPhones are also pretty damn good MP3 players (in addition to the 50 million other things that they can do).
So there is your answer. iPod sales are slowing down. It's not Apple's fault, nor is it an Apple weakness. It is simply market reality and the nature of market demand. Even with the iPod sales slowing down, iPods are still the solid #1 selling player, by far outselling those horrible and infamous Zunes.
iPods might not be Apple's best-selling gem any more, but as long as they bring in decent revenue and some modest profits, the iTunes Store model is not going away any time soon.
I think this is pretty good proof of concept of Apple’s strategy for its music business. They’re providing a convenient and effective channel for honest people to buy digital music. Though we’ll never know how effective it is against piracy, if at all, honest customers, at least, won’t be tempted to resort to p-to-p “sharing.”
@iphonerulez
I think it’s been obvious for a while now that with these types of numbers – Apple is definitely making money from music directly, even though this is not a priority for them.
iPod sales are not slipping. iPhones are iPods, too. The big ‘problem’ Apple has is that it’s highest end iPod is leading sales.
iPod is morphing into iPhone for a lot of people. That market is nowhere NEAR saturated.
@Brian
Great deduction of the facts.