For the eighth year in a row, vinyl records have outsold CDs by both unit and revenue, according to industry figures published this week. The numbers continue a trend that has long since stopped surprising anyone in the music business — but that nonetheless represents one of the more durable cultural reversals of the last two decades.
Independent record shops report that new releases on coloured vinyl, limited-edition reissues and artist-curated box sets continue to drive sales. CDs remain popular in a handful of regional markets — particularly in parts of East Asia, where they have retained cultural significance tied to artist merchandise — but their share of the physical-music category has shrunk to historic lows.
The shape of the market
Vinyl sales are now overwhelmingly skewed toward new releases rather than catalogue. A decade ago, the format's resurgence was driven by reissues of classic albums; today, major-label new releases routinely launch with vinyl pressings alongside digital and streaming. Many of those pressings are limited or variant editions, designed to drive collectible value as much as listening.
That collectibility has, in turn, created its own market dynamics. Resale prices for sought-after pressings on the secondary market often exceed retail by significant margins within weeks of release. Some artists and labels have responded by reissuing popular editions; others have leaned into scarcity as a feature.
The pressing-plant bottleneck
One unglamorous constraint on the market is physical: the number of vinyl pressing plants worldwide is much smaller than it was during the format's twentieth-century peak, and many existing plants run at or near capacity. Major-label releases routinely book pressing slots months in advance, which can leave smaller independent labels waiting six months or more for short runs.
Several new pressing plants have opened in the past three years, and a handful of older facilities have been refurbished, but capacity remains tight. The bottleneck is one of the few aspects of the vinyl economy that meaningfully constrains its growth.
Putting the numbers in context
Analysts caution that the comparison flatters vinyl somewhat. Total physical-music sales remain a small fraction of streaming revenue — the entire vinyl market, even at current peak levels, is roughly equivalent to the streaming revenue generated by a handful of top-tier artists in a year. The growth story is real but, in absolute terms, modest.
Still, the format's durability — sustained well beyond what almost anyone predicted a decade ago — is now widely treated as a structural feature of the music market rather than a passing revival. Streaming and physical media appear, for now, to coexist comfortably, each serving a different listening occasion and a different relationship with the music itself.