"I'm so glad to see that my music is being heard"
In 2021, Spotify launched in Pakistan, allowing local artists to reach new fans both at home and abroad.
Almost a year later, Spotify is celebrating its first year in the country by unveiling some statistics on how Pakistani music fared spectacularly well around the world.
According to Spotify, there have been over 19,590 songs added to the platform from creators in Pakistan over the past year.
Amongst its 406 million listeners worldwide, the top countries listening to Pakistani music are India, the USA and the UK.
The data also revealed the most-streamed Pakistani artists outside of the country.
The top streamed Pakistani artist abroad is Atif Aslam.
Rahat Fateh Ali Khan was the second most-streamed Pakistani artist abroad, followed closely by his uncle, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, who came in third.
Momina Mustehsan landed the fourth spot while Bilal Saeed came in fifth.
‘Baari’ by Saeed and Mustehsan was the top most-streamed song abroad.
The duo made another appearance with ‘Uchiyaan Deewaraan’ in the fourth spot, and Momina Mustehsan came in ninth with Adnan Dhool in ‘Awari’.
Additionally, Young Stunners’ hits ‘Gumaan’, ‘Don’t Mind’ with Rap Demon and ‘Afsanay’ came third, seventh and eighth, respectively.
Atif Aslam’s hit songs ‘Kadi Te Has Bol’ with Velo Sound Station, ‘Jeena Jeena (Badlapur)’, and ‘Tere Sang Yaara’ ranked high in the top 10 most streamed songs as well.
Within Pakistani music available on Spotify, 11% of the Pakistani Indie genre was streamed in the US, seeing a growth of more than 150% globally in 2021.
Additionally, Pakistani Electronic is gaining momentum with 23% of the genre streamed in the US, Canada, the UK and Germany, accumulating to a 223% increase in global streams since Spotify’s launch in Pakistan.
Speaking about how things have changed for him since Spotify entered the local scene, Turhan James, a Pakistani electronic music producer, said:
“I’m so glad to see that my music is being heard so much since Spotify launched in Pakistan.
“I personally feel that it has been an absolute game-changer for our music industry.”
Local hip-hop was also amongst the most popular genres abroad.
More than 63% of the streams for the genre came from outside Pakistan and witnessed a 70% growth in global streams.
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