So Who Was the Most-Streamed Artist in the World and in Canada (According to Spotify, Anyway)?

December 3, 2014 Alan Cross 0 Comments

Get over it, Thom Yorke and Taylor Swift: streaming is here to stay. Yeah, there are still some details to work out–like how to keep the streaming services from hemorrhaging money–but the sector is only going to continue to grow.

Spotify, the 800 pound gorilla in the streaming space, has released its list of the most-streamed artists for 2014. The 50 million Spotify users streamed 7 billion hours of music–and the artist that got the biggest share of those hours was, believe it or not, Ed Sheeran.

Yes, ginger Ed had his songs heard 860 million times around the world through Spotify. His last album, x, was streamed 430 million. I wonder how much he earned from that? The most-streamed female was Katy Perry while the most-streamed newcomer was Hozier thanks to “Take Me to Church.” And what one song received the most listens? “Happy” by Pharrell Williams with 260,000,000 streams.

Spotify launched in Canada at the very end of September, so there’s not a lot of data to sift through, but the company can tell us that Ariana Grande was the most-streamed artist and the track people heard the most was “Blame” by Calvin Harris. And yeah, we streamed x by Ed Sheeran the most, just like the rest of the planet.

Here are a few more lists:

Top Five Global Artists