In the wake of a report from the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) that there were more than 100 billion music streams in the United Kingdom, GfK Entertainment and the German Music Industry Association (BVMI) announced that the same thing had happened in Germany.
There were 107 billion music streams in Germany during 2019. Like in the U.K., this is the first time that there have been more than 100 billion streams in the country.
In 2018, there were 79.5 billion music streams in Germany. So, today’s number represents a 34.6% increase from a year ago. There were only 56.4 billion streams back in 2017.
Interestingly, the two most streamed songs in the country for a single day were both sung in English. Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You” registered 3.2 million streams on Christmas Eve while Wham!’s “Last Christmas” got 3 million streams on the very same day.
Dr. Florian Druecke, who is the chairman of BVMI, issued a statement regarding today’s news and the state of the German music industry.
He said, “More than one hundred billion audio streams in Germany in 2019 – this is not only a milestone, it also shows the ongoing considerable dynamics in this segment and thus the acceptance by music fans: Within only two years, since 2017. Streaming continues to expand its position, but at the same time the other usage formats remain relevant, and our members’ offerings continue to range from vinyl to the cloud.”
Dr. Mathias Giloth, who is the managing director of GfK Entertainment, also issued a statement. He said, “New records [were] set on Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve as the days with the highest number of streaming to date with 431 million and 407 million streams respectively. At the beginning of the year, the daily number of streams was still under 250 million in some cases. This shows that enormous leaps are still possible in the format that has been part of the official German charts since 2014.”