African Artists Are Reaching More Global Listeners With Help From Audiomack
Music industry data analytics collector, Soundcharts, is teaming up with streaming and discovery platform, Audiomack, to help continue African music’s global expansion trajectory.
Audiomack Partners with Soundcharts to Highlight Global Music Growth
In a move that speaks directly to the shifting center of gravity in global music, Audiomack has announced a new partnership with music analytics platform Soundcharts — one that could significantly expand how African listening habits, rising artists, and cross-border trends are captured in industry data.
The integration brings Audiomack’s playlists and its influential Weekly 100 Geo Charts into Soundcharts’ massive analytics ecosystem for the first time, placing emerging African creators alongside more than 15 million artists and 85 million songs tracked worldwide. For labels, managers, agents, and marketers, this represents a newly hyper-clear view of where African music is resonating, both across the continent and within listening communities in Europe and North America.
For Audiomack, the collaboration continues its long-running mission to help artists reach global audiences and make sure their streaming success actually translates into recognition and opportunity on a world-wide scale. And for Soundcharts, the addition fills what the company openly calls a “long-standing gap” in how African music consumption has been represented in industry data — an omission that has become increasingly unsustainable as the region’s output grows impossible to ignore.
Behind this announcement is something bigger: African music isn’t just growing; it is reshaping global listening patterns at a pace the industry is still struggling to fully quantify. The story of African music in the 2020s is one of accelerating influence — and overdue visibility.
What’s Fuelling the Momentum of African Music’s Global Reach Right Now?
African music’s global reach has expanded at an extraordinary pace, transforming once-local scenes into international cultural forces. Spotify’s “Afrobeats: Culture in Motion” initiative reported more than 240 million global discoveries of Afrobeats in the past year, while Spotify Wrapped data shows global Afrobeats listenership rising 22%.
This momentum isn’t driven solely by Western audiences — Latin America in particular has emerged as an unexpected growth engine, with Afrobeats listenership there surging by nearly 180% year-on-year. At the same time, consumption within homegrown audiences in Africa continues to rise as well. In Nigeria alone, local music listening increased 82% over the past year, with daily streams up another 23%.
This expansion is tied to several structural and cultural aspects of the continent’s music economy. Widespread access to smartphones and mobile internet — often supported by telecom-bundled streaming plans — has opened the door for millions of new listeners across Africa. Global streaming platforms have also deepened their investment through dedicated editorial teams, localized playlists, artist development programs, and more robust on-the-ground presence, helping connect regional scenes to worldwide audiences.
Because contemporary genres like Afrobeats and Amapiano blend local rhythmic traditions with familiar global elements from pop, hip-hop, and dance, they’ve become instantly accessible to international listeners.
Social platforms like TikTok and Instagram Reels have had an impact too. Tracks like Rema’s “Calm Down,” have been boosted by viral moments and high-profile collaborations. All of these forces combined have created an environment where African music is not just traveling farther — it’s becoming foundational to global listening habits.
What This Means for African Artists and Global Listeners
African music is no longer niche or even framed as “world music” — an oft-criticized term that originated in academic, ethnomusicological circles but was co-opted by North American record labels in the 1980s to market and sell music from a large group of unassociated cultures. African music today has become a core part of mainstream global media consumption, showing up everywhere from top playlists to festival stages and beyond music entirely, in cultural spaces like fashion, film, and food.
As Africa’s music ecosystem continues to mature — with better monetization, stronger infrastructure, and more sustained industry investment — the continent’s share of global revenue and cultural influence is poised to keep rising, even if the overall market base remains relatively small for now.
Artists from the continent should be setting their sights on attracting listeners abroad, since there’s proven interest and support from a globalized cultural community.
And for audiences newly discovering this wealth of entertainment, African music offers rich, diverse, and globally resonant sounds that are now a natural part of everyday listening, embedded across streaming libraries and playlists that already feel comfortable.
About Audiomack
Audiomack is a music streaming and discovery platform that connects artists with fans. With over 47 million monthly users, the service enables artists to upload unlimited music for free and features a curated library that includes songs from all three major labels, as well as more than 400 independent labels. Tools like Connect, Boost, and Audiomod help artists engage their audience and build community. Audiomack is home to over 1 million active creators and ranks among the top music apps in more than 20 countries.
About Soundcharts
Soundcharts is a music industry data analytics platform that provides a comprehensive view of the global music landscape with real-time statistics on artist audiences, playlist entries, chart positions, airplay, venues, and festival activities. We integrate data from streaming platforms, radio, and social media to help industry professionals make informed decisions.
