The Music Apps You're Not Using Just Hit $106M

While Apple Music and Spotify battle it out for supremacy, a quieter revolution is happening in music streaming. Non-traditional players like Pandora, Amazon Music, YouTube Music, SoundCloud, and Tidal are seeing serious growth, and in 2025, they've collectively reached an all-time high in revenue.

Together, these five apps earned $106M in net revenue in October 2025, according to Appfigures Intelligence. That's up from $88M in October 2024, a whopping 21% year-over-year increase. And what's more interesting? Every single one of them contributed to that growth.

YouTube Music Is the Standout

YouTube Music has been the surprise winner in this group, earning $38M in net revenue in October. That's a 41% increase compared to October 2024 and 54% higher than January of 2024, and here's what makes it impressive: YouTube Music has grown every single month since the beginning of 2024. No dips. No plateaus. Just consistent, steady growth.

It's clear YouTube's strategy of bundling music with video and leveraging its massive existing user base is paying off. Users already know YouTube, so the transition to YouTube Music feels natural rather than requiring a completely new platform.

The Old Guard Isn't Dead

Pandora, the OG of streaming radio, pulled in $29M in October after fees, up from $24M last year, according to our estimates. For a service that's been around since before "streaming" was even a buzzword, this is impressive. Pandora had its ups and downs over the years, but 2025 has treated it well with steady growth through most of the year.

SoundCloud earned $13M in October, up from $11M last year. What makes SoundCloud interesting is that it's not really competing with Spotify or any of these apps on the same terms because it's a platform for independent artists and emerging creators. Its growth suggests that independent music isn't just surviving, it's thriving, and people are willing to pay to get it.

New(er) Players Are Growing Too

Amazon Music and Tidal round out the group with $19M and $5.2M respectively. Both saw solid year-over-year growth—Amazon Music up 19% and Tidal up 20% vs 2024.

Tidal's 20% growth is particularly noteworthy given its smaller size and focus on high-fidelity audio, a niche that many thought wouldn't be big enough to support a standalone service but turns out it is.

What's Driving This?

I think what's driving the demand are prices and discovery.

Apple Music and Spotify keep raising prices and making changes users don't always love. That creates openings for alternatives with similar catalogs like YouTube Music, Amazon Music, and Tidal.

On the other side we have discovery - with radio no longer being something most people use, it's becoming hard to find new music. Sure, Spotify and Apple Music have suggestions, but those usually silo you into the same stuff you already know. SoundCloud's indie artist focus and Pandora's radio-style discovery are different.

The music streaming market isn't a winner-take-all game anymore. There's real room for competition, and these numbers prove it.