How Many Songs are There in the World? (2023)

• It is estimated that there are roughly between 97 to 230 million songs in the world, although no one can know the exact number. 
• Spotify has more than 100 million songs and adds 60,000 new songs every day, while Gracenote had roughly 200 million songs registered up until 2018.  
• With access to music production becoming far easier, the number of songs created each year is rising quickly. 
• There is no definitive answer to this question, as the number of songs is ever-growing and constantly changing.

While it is impossible to estimate the number of songs worldwide. This is only an estimation based on the number of active artists and the average number of songs released yearly, as the number constantly rises.

Before we get into the statistics of it all, it is vital to remember that not only original songs fall under the term ‘songs.’ As we all know, there are many cover versions of songs that have their own recordings and have done quite well as standalone, even in instances where they have surpassed the original version.

For instance, there are many remastered versions of songs like “Yesterday” by The Beatles,  which also count as new song entries on platforms like Spotify. Not to mention the countless ‘live versions’ that have landed a spot on recordings, CDs, vinyl, etc. And we can’t count out ‘remixes.’ With all this in mind, there should be a HUGE number of songs in the world.

Songs in the World According to Spotify

Spotify is very dominant in music streaming at this point, so it’s no surprise that their word should be considered regarding this question. Spotify has been around since 2008, and they’ve been adding new artists and songs to their library every day.

According to Spotify’s data, they maintain a database of more than 100 million songs and a record of 60,000 new songs added every day. This is a massive figure, which simply demonstrates why Spotify is the world’s most popular music streaming service and has the most subscribers.

Coming back to the statistics, this puts Spotify to have an average of one song being uploaded every 1.4 seconds. This is truly an interesting fact to consider since the data was recorded by the end of 2021. Each year, 22 million new songs are uploaded to Spotify on average.

Also another interesting fact is that almost 80% of Spotify artists have less than 50 monthly listeners. So, Spotify is an ocean of music, but there the majority of the platform consists of songs that are far from being popular.

Songs in the World According to Gracenote

Gracenote is a Global Music Data Company that provides a comprehensive understanding of music and music fandom to more than 1.5 billion consumers every day. They keep a large registry of music data, and they provide it to many different people and companies.

According to Gracenote’s registry, they had roughly about 79 million songs up until 2011. This surely puts a question mark over all the other answers because that data was 11 years ago. Going forward with said data, Gracenote had 200 million songs registered up until 2018.

Now, a lot of factors can come into play here if we take the statement that a new song comes out every two minutes – then from 2018 up until now, there should be a higher number of songs in the world.

Taking into consideration that Gracenote is one of the most well-known and comprehensive Global Music Data collection platforms, it’s still hard to choose between Gracenote and Spotify, seeing as they’re both very large platforms. Again, it’s hard to determine which answer is correct even with knowing the data they set out.

Are there even more Songs in the world?

Undoubtedly, there are more songs that any platform will keep a record of. Taking into consideration that not all songs that are made are recorded or released, who knows how many songs there actually are in the world?

This is something that no one can know for sure; the number of songs will always remain a mystery, regardless of what any platform statistics say. There is a lot of undocumented work without question. Nevertheless, all we can do is rely on statistics at this moment.

If we consider how many unreleased versions of songs there are, then that number rises even higher. Like Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah,” supposedly, Cohen had around 70-80 verses written and chose only 7 for the original version. He was known to throw in others when performing the song live.

Another important fact is that with music production technology becoming more accessible, the number of songs created each year is also increasing. With so many plug-ins, the help of AI programs, and many courses and videos about music production and recording, anybody can create a piece of music with a little effort, increasing the number of songs in the world. 

For instance, according to this Billboard article, more than 100,000 tracks will be uploaded to streaming platforms each day in 2023.

Conclusion

The question of how many songs there are in the world is simply impossible to answer with an accurate number. Some large online platforms have their own data, but it’s hard to confirm which numbers can be trusted.

Sources from around the web estimate that there are at least 97 to 230 million songs in the world. Spotify states they have more than 100 million. With potentially 100,000 tracks being uploaded to streaming platforms in a single day, it’s very safe to assume that this number is going to grow quite significantly.

Another interesting fact is that Gracenote had 200 million songs registered until 2018, which means an average of 56,000 songs were uploaded each day, or 1 every two minutes. With this in mind, it’s safe to say the number will be way higher than 200 million going into the early to mid-2020s.

In conclusion, it’s safe to assume that there is a growing number of songs being uploaded daily. With so many platforms fighting to have the best and most comprehensive registry, it will be interesting to see where things stand ten years from now.