Global South genres account for around a fifth of revenue, streams and label count in an analysis of 10,500 record labels. The findings show their current place in the streaming market as subscriber growth continues across Global South markets.
MIDiA Research mapped the labels by country, revenue, genre and distributor. Rock, pop and hip hop lead across all three measures. The Global South genres examined include Afrobeats, amapiano, K-pop, Arabic pop, Bhangra, Punjabi hip hop, phonk, sertanejo and cumbia.
Global South markets have been major drivers of subscriber growth this decade, but their lower average revenue per user means they still account for a minority of streaming revenue. MIDiA expects rising local streams to bring more genres onto global charts, where recommendation algorithms could introduce them to wider audiences. Reggaeton followed a similar path nearly a decade ago.
Labels in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) currently export five times less of their music than US and European labels. MIDiA expects international streams, including those from diaspora audiences, to increase those labels’ exposure to higher-revenue Western markets.
Distribution could also shape that growth. Believe distributes around half of the Turkish labels included among the world’s top 10,500 labels in the dataset.
