Music streaming is on the up, but album sales are devastatingly down. In fact, album sales in the U.S. are reportedly worse than they’ve been in over a decade — and streaming could be largely to blame.
A current snapshot of music sales comes with Drake’s Scorpion. The album just set the bar remarkably high in terms of music streaming, shattering the one-week record with over one billion plays. To put this into perspective, Post Malone previously held the title with 700 million global streams for his latest record Beerbongs & Bentleys.
However, as far as album sales go, only 29,000 copies of Scorpion were sold during the week of July 12th. According to Nielsen, that is the smallest amount of sales that a No. 1, top-selling album has made since 1991. Most of which have been made through digital downloads including iTunes and Amazon Music, not physical copies. 
It’s not just Drake. Overall, album sales are plummeting, too. Sales through 2018 so far accumulate to 72.73 million, down 17% compared to this time last year. CD sales are down by 19% and even digital album sales are taking a huge hit, down 21% (via Digital Music News).
Music listening habits may be changing, but it’s important to support your favorite artists no matter what — whether you choose to stream or buy.
Source: Digital Music News
