Decade in Review
Music Industry Milestones
2010
CD Baby
Delivers to French streaming service Deezer.
Reaches $100 million in payouts to artists.
Partners with Spotify.
February 2010
The iTunes Store reaches 10 billion songs sold.
March 2010A year-and-a-half after its founding, Spotify announces plans to enter the U.S. market.
Pandora Radio reaches 50 million users.
November 2010Spotify integrates with music-discovery app Shazam.
2011
March 2011
Spotify reaches one million paying subscribers.
June 2011Pandora Radio goes public on the New York Stock Exchange.
July 2011Spotify launches in the U.S.
October 2011Rhapsody announces its purchase of Napster from Best Buy.
November 2011Apple launches iTunes Match, a cloud-storage service for music.
Google launches Google Play Music.
2012
CD Baby
Reaches $250 million in payouts to artists.
Partners with Amazon Music.
1 million songs administered on YouTube.
Digital catalog reaches 5 million songs.
Active artists reach 500,000.
August 2012
10 years after its debut, Shazam announces it has identified five billion songs.
December 2012Spotify reaches five million subscribers. (It also adds the catalog of formerly streaming-averse band Metallica to its database.)
2013
CD Baby
2 million songs administered on YouTube.
February 2013CD Baby Pro Publishing Administration is launched.
February 2013
The iTunes Store reaches 25 billion sales. Apple also reports an average of 15,000 songs sold per minute.
April 2013Pandora reaches 200 million users, 70 million of which are monthly active users.
The iTunes Store turns 10.
2014
CD Baby
CD Baby partners with Apple Music before its launch in 2015.
May 2014
Spotify reaches 10 million subscribers.
June 2014Amazon launches Prime Music, its first streaming service, free for Prime members.
August 2014Apple acquires Beats Electronics and Beats Music for three billion dollars, laying the groundwork for what will become Apple’s own streaming service.
October 2014Shazam announces it has been used to identify 15 billion songs.
November 2014Taylor Swift becomes first major artist to pull her music from Spotify.
2015
CD Baby
3 million songs administered on YouTube.
June 2015
CD Baby delivers catalog to Apple Music for its launch date.
January 2015
Jay Z’s company Project Panther Bidco Ltd. pays 56 million dollars in takeover purchase of Norwegian lossless music streaming service Aspiro.
March 2015Jay Z – along with several notable artists including Rihanna and Kanye West – launches Tidal. The new streaming service uses Aspiro’s platform to offer paid-only, high-quality lossless streaming. This is in direct competition to the lossy quality of Spotify.
June 2015Apple announces Apple Music in early June. They officially launch the new service at the end of the month with a fee of $9.99 per month.
November 2015YouTube Music launches as a free streaming service.
Pandora buys technology, intellectual property and other assets from on-demand streaming service Rdio.
2016
CD Baby
Reaches $500 million in payouts to artists.
January 2016
Apple Music reaches 10 million subscribers.
March 2016Tidal announces three million subscribers.
June 2016Rhapsody rebrands as Napster in the U.S., keeping consistent with its branding internationally.
July 2016Almost nine years after its launch in October 2007, Google announces YouTube Content ID has paid out $2 billion to rights holders.
September 2016Pandora signs licensing deals with major labels Universal Music and Sony Music, along with dozens of other labels and distributors.
Shazam crosses the 1 billion download mark and officially achieves a profit.
October 2016Amazon launches Amazon Music Unlimited, a streaming service with tens of millions of songs; a much larger catalog than Prime Music.
2017
March 2017
CD Baby Pro Publishing reaches 100,000 songwriters.
June 2017Taylor Swift puts her catalog back on Spotify.
2018
CD Baby
May 2018Offers artists monetization for their music in Facebook videos.
August 2018CD Baby Pro Publishing reaches 1 million songs.
May 2018
YouTube Music launches an ad-free paid service for $9.99 per month.
2019
CD Baby
February 2019Begins delivering music to Instagram.
November 2019CD Baby Pro Publishing reaches 225,000 songwriters.
CD Baby reaches $750 million in payouts to artists.
Digital catalog reaches 9 million songs.
Deezer starts the year with 7 million subscribers and 14 million total users.
January 2019Apple Music reaches 50 million subscribers.
May 2019YouTube Music reaches 15 million subscribers.
June 2019Apple announces plans to close iTunes and split the service into three distinct areas: Music, TV and Podcasts.
July 2019Amazon Music reaches 32 million subscribers.
September 2019Amazon Music launches Amazon Music HD, a streaming service offering lossless quality files.