Thursday, Jan. 15, 2026 | 2 a.m.
Editor’s note: “Behind the News” is the product of Sun staff assisted by the Sun’s AI lab, which includes a variety of tools such as Anthropic’s Claude, Perplexity AI, Google Gemini and ChatGPT.
The global music industry hit 5.1 trillion streams in 2025, a new single-year record up 9.6% from 2024, which held the previous record. In the U.S., on-demand audio streams reached 1.4 trillion, a 4.6% increase from last year. [1]
Rock reclaims streaming throne
Rock reclaimed its streaming throne in 2025, becoming the year’s largest growth genre in a music landscape increasingly dominated by catalog tracks.
“Rock is the largest growth genre this year, meaning it grew its share of the streaming pie the most,” said Jaime Marconette, Luminate’s vice president of music insights and industry relations, in a statement. “Though rock streaming in general leans catalog (tracks older than 18 months), the genre posted the second-highest total of new current streams this year.” [1]
The genre grew 6.4% in on-demand audio volume compared with 2024, according to Luminate’s 2025 Year-End Report, reaching about 260.5 billion on-demand audio streams in the U.S. [1]
Most‑streamed rock artists right now
Using recent Spotify playlist‑reach data as a proxy for who is getting the most streams in rock:
- Coldplay — roughly 377 million playlist reach, the highest among rock artists, which points to enormous ongoing streaming exposure.
- Imagine Dragons — about 243 million playlist reach, leading the more pop‑crossover side of modern rock streaming.
- Fleetwood Mac — around 188 million playlist reach, showing how strongly classic catalog tracks continue to stream.
- Queen — about 181 million playlist reach, another…