Early stats point to Mixed 2025 for Live Music

After several years of meteoric growth in live music, an analysis by Pollstar of the period of November 14, 2024 to February 12, 2025 point to a mixed 2025 for live music.

Early stats point to Mixed 2025 for Live Music

Growth in live music had already slowed in 2024 with the grosses for the Top 100 tours only 3.6% above 2023. Ticket sales were down slightly by less than 1% and most of the growth came from higher ticket prices.

As live music enters 2025, the reverse is now true.

via Pollstar

Still above $1 billion, total grosses for the last three months are down 6.4% percent, while the number of tickets sold was up 17.3% for the Top 100 touring artists, according to Pollstar data.

The average per show gross also fell year-over-year by 5%, while the average number of tickets sold per show was up 18.8%

Lower Ticket Prices

In what may point to a right-sizing of ticket prices, contributing to the lower grosses and higher sales was a rare drop in average ticket prices.

So fat this year, the average ticket price is $98.40, down 20.2% from $123.25 in 2024.

Read the full Pollstar Q1 analysis here.

Bruce Houghton is the Founder and Editor of Hypebot, a Senior Advisor at Bandsintown, a Berklee College Of Music professor and founder of the Skyline Artists Agency