Digital Music Sales Up 45%

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Digital Music Sales Up 45%

50 Million Digital Albums Sold in 2007

Total overall music purchases were up in 2007, while album sales continued their decline according to Nielsen SoundScan's year-end sales figures.

Music sales, which combine albums, singles, music videos and digital tracks, increased to 1,369,000 from 1,198,000 with a 14 percent increase.* Overall album sales dropped 9.5 percent. The purchasing of physical CDs online grew by 2.4 percent and 20 percent of total album sales for the year took place in the last six weeks of the year.

Digital music sales numbers continue to increase, as 844.2 million digital tracks were sold in 2007, a 45 percent increase from 2006. Fifty million digital albums were purchased in 2007, a 53 percent increase over the previous year. Digital music accounted for 23 percent of all music purchases in 2007.

Universal Music Group had the largest share of the market with 31.9 percent, a small increase over 2006. Sony BMG had the second largest share with 24.97 percent a decrease from 27.44 percent the year before. Warner Music Group had a small growth in its market share, from 18.14 percent up to 20.2 percent. EMI was the fourth largest major label with a 9.37 percent share.