Annual Market Report 2025 | Go to the latest release |
There are always spikes and variations in some categories and different trends over time for particular categories or sections, but the overall result in 2025 was essentially flat, with inflation-adjusted market value increasing by just 1.2%. The most recent substantial change was the 10% drop in value from 2023 to 2024, but the market stayed close to that level in 2025.
- 2025 total market value: $AU468.4 million (import value) / $AU1.17 billion (estimated retail value)
- Total value for 2025 is similar to 2024, but both years are about 10% lower than 2023
- Year-on-year change: +1.2%
Economic Overview
| Key Economic Indicators | 2025 (Year-end) | 2024 (Year-end) | 2023 (Year-End) |
| GDP Growth (annual)[1] | 2.5% | 1.2% | 0.80% |
| Unemployment Rate[2] | 4.3% | 4.0% | 4.00% |
| Inflation (CPI, annual)[3] | 3.5% | 2.4% | 4.10% |
| Cash Rate (end of year)[4] | 3.6% | 4.35% | 4.35% |
| AUD/USD Exchange Rate (avg)[5] | 0.645 | 0.645 | 0.675 |
In 2025, Australia’s economy grew by 2.5%, an improvement on the 1.2% growth recorded in 2024. The labour market remained relatively strong, although the unemployment rate increased slightly to 4.3% in December.
Inflation rose to 3.5% in the year to December 2025, above the RBA’s 2–3% target range and higher than the 2.4% recorded in 2024. Despite this, the RBA reduced the cash rate to 3.6% by the end of the year.
The Australian dollar averaged $US0.645 during 2025, unchanged from 2024, providing a relatively stable exchange rate environment for importers and exporters.
Music Products Industry Summary
The growth in 2025 was largely in the Pro Audio section rather than musical instruments, so the same table for musical instruments shows a slight contraction and the market is even further below the 5-year average. That 5-year comparison is obviously still skewed by the spike in many categories around the pandemic years (2020, 2021).
Despite declines in some musical instrument sections and only modest growth in the market overall, one way to interpret the 2025 result is as a year of stability. The overall year-on-year change in market value for the years 2021 to 2025 has been +15%, +12%, -19%, -10% and now +1%, making 2025 the most stable year of the post-pandemic period. The average year-on-year change over the period covered by this report was 3%.
Looking at the same calculation but excluding Pro Audio, the 2% drop for total value of musical instruments (and accessories) in 2025 looks stable after +19% in 2021 (pandemic spike), +2% in 2022 (still high), -22% in 2023 (substantial post-pandemic drop, and -10% in 2024. Units is a less useful measure for the overall market, but on that basis there was a 7% decrease which just about made up for the 8% increase in 2024, the average year-on-year change over the period covered by this report was 0%.
The overall ‘stable’ result is an average, with some categories increasing or decreasing substantially. The biggest year-on-year increases included Power Amplifiers, Bass Guitars and Wireless Microphones, while the biggest decreases included Drum Kits, Synthesizers and Other Wind. Sometimes a pattern is not consistent across a product type, for example in Percussion. A lot of the ‘Other Electronic Instruments’ category (+14.5%) is electronic drums and Individual Drums increased by a similar proportion (+14.2%), some companies have indicated a relatively stable year for drums, but Drum Kits dropped by 37.9%.
The market share of each section barely changed, with a slight increase in the share for Pro Audio (37.3% in 2025 vs 35.7% in 2024) partly coming from the decrease for Brass, Wind & Strings (6.1% vs 7.3%). All other categories were within one percentage point of the 2024 result as a proportion of the market. Looking at market share over a 10-year period however, Pianos & Keyboards had the most significant drop, with its 13.2% market share in 2025 being well below its 17.6% average over 10 years. Pro Audio moved in the opposite direction, with the 2025 result being 3.5% above the 10-year average market share, while other sections stayed within 1 percentage point of the 10-year average.
Tariffs & Trade Tensions
There are several reasons to expect that trade tensions during the past year, particularly those arising from US-China relations and reciprocal tariffs, may have affected the market. While there are hints of impacts in some categories, including shifts in countries of origin, these effects are not apparent in the aggregate data. The analysis of imports by region was broadly similar in 2025 to 2024.
For reference, Australia collected just over $1 million in duty on music products in 2025, 0.23% of total revenue, which is consistent with 2024 (0.22%).
Pianos & Keyboards
Estimated retail value: $155 million
The Pianos & Keyboards section has declined overall in the past decade, with over 25% decline in value (inflation adjusted) over both the 5-year and 10-year averages. The good news is in the relative stability of the category overall, with almost no change in original value and only a slight drop when adjusted for inflation (-3.1%), and a 30% increase in units. The recovery in units mostly comes from the two categories with the most units, Digital Pianos and Portable Keyboards, which both showed a similar pattern: well above 2023 & 2024, about the same as 2022, still lower than the spike in 2020 & 2021. While these two categories have shown remarkably similar trends over the past 5 years, taking into account the 5 years prior to the pandemic the trend is Digital Pianos up, Portable Keyboards down.
In the acoustic piano market, Upright Pianos dropped substantially in both units (-33.8%) and value (13.5%, adjusted), both measures are in line with a decline over the 5- and 10-year comparisons that coincide with an increase in Digital Pianos. Grand Pianos have also fallen but 2025 was quite similar to 2024.
Guitars
Estimated Retail Value: $206 million
There are some notable shifts in the Guitars section but there was almost no change at all in total units (+0.2%) compared to the previous year. Value did increase, but only by 1.8%.
The comparison to the 5-year average is still severe (-12.5% in units, -18.1% in value) but that includes the spike in the pandemic years that was most pronounced in the Guitars section.
Acoustic Guitars are up slightly (+11.2% in units, +5.4% in value), Electric Guitars fell by 1% in value with a 5.2% drop in units, Bass Guitars were the strongest category (+9.3 in units, +17.7% in value). Ukuleles (and other/traditional fretted stringed instruments) and amps (the Combo Amplifiers category) were both down in units. Unlike Percussion and Pianos/Keyboards where some categories are increasing while others decrease suggesting a replacement between categories, the Guitars section has been moving in a similar direction across the different categories.
Brass, Wind & Strings
Estimated retail value: $71 million
In 2024 the Brass, Wind & Strings section increased in value but units fell by 23.5%. The 2025 result overall is the reverse, with units recovering (17.1% higher than 2024) but value falling by 16.3%. The drop is largely in Other Wind while the main woodwind instrument (clarinet/flute/sax), brass and orchestral stringed instrument categories were more stable. There are small shifts such as Brass increasing in value (2.4%) and every other measure while the other categories fell. There is some stability in value with Saxophones being almost even across 2024 & 2025, and ($1m higher) across 2022 & 2023; Clarinets in 2025 were equal in value to 2023, and the combination of Orchestral Strings & Brass was almost the same across 2024 & 2025 but the balance shifted slightly in favour of Brass instruments.
Brass, Wind & Strings overall represents the highest proportionate drop in value of any section in 2025, and reached the lowest point in 5 years.
Percussion
Estimated retail value: $41 million
A significant drop in Drum Kits (-37.9% in value) was offset in every other category, leading to an overall increase of 3.4% for the Percussion section. Units are a less useful measure for the section because Educational & Other Percussion contains a large number of relatively low-value items. Units did fall in all but the low average value category (Educational & Other Percussion) but overall there was an increase in units from 2024 to 2025.
The lack of clarity in the ‘Other Electronic Instruments’ category makes us reluctant to place it with percussion, even though a substantial proportion of that category is electronic drums, but it is fair to say the data tells us acoustic drum kits are being replaced over time by electronic kits. This trend appears in a particularly severe drop in units, although some of the result may reflect the timing of orders rather than underlying demand.
DJ & Electronic Instruments
Estimated retail value: $93 million
This section has been generally strong and increasing in value over the past decade, notwithstanding a weak result in 2023. The main ‘instrument’ categories here, Synthesizers and ‘Other’ (including electronic drums) moved in different directions, with Synthesizers falling to the lowest number of units in a decade (-31.4%) and one of the highest drops in value (-23.8%). Other Electronic Instruments shows the opposite pattern, with a 32.7% increase in units and 14.5% increase in value. The Average Unit Values for these categories also moved in opposite directions (up for Synthesizers, down for Other Electronic Instruments).
We remain cautious about reading anything into the Turntables data but maintain this reporting for comparison purposes. There was a small increase in both units & value.
Pro Audio
Estimated retail value: $436 million
The year-on-year and 10-year average comparisons in the Market Report summary show that the Pro Audio section has grown proportionately more than the other sections, and remains the largest part of the music products market, but units did fall by 19.6%. Overall the section is relatively stable and 2025 looks very much like 2023.
Interestingly, every major Pro Audio category increased in value in 2025, the drop in units was mostly in the two microphone categories.
Accessories
Estimated retail value: $172 million
The overall Accessories section is stable for the third year in a row, with 0.3% increase in value (year on year) following 0.4% last year.
Within this category there is some movement, with the highest proportionate increase in Guitar & Bass Strings (+6.5%), while most other categories did increase a little.
Like last year, total value for the year was below the 5-year average (-2.1%), but this result is comfortably above the 10 year average (8.5%). Read more
Print Music data was not available at the time of reporting.
Notable Trends
Among the strongest year-on-year growth categories in 2025 were Power Amplifiers, Bass Guitars and Wireless Microphones. The average annual growth in value for the whole market is 3%, but it is normal for half of the categories to sit well outside this average and for categories to move around from one year to another.
On the other end of the spectrum, the steepest declines in value came from Other Wind, Drum Kits and Synthesizers.
The group of categories with more than 3% increase included several Pro Audio, Guitars and Percussion categories, while the group with more than a 3% decrease includes both acoustic piano categories and several Brass, Wind & Strings categories. The categories with a year-on -year increase have a mix of positive and negative comparisons to the 5-year average, while those with a substantial year-on-year decrease also have a substantial decrease compared to the 5-year average. Many of the categories recording substantial declines in 2025 were also below their five-year averages, suggesting that some of these declines may reflect longer-term trends rather than short-term fluctuations.
Unless otherwise stated, percentage comparisons in this Executive Summary are based on inflation-adjusted values. Estimated retail value includes both the inflation adjustment, and the 2.5x uplift from import value.
Download this Executive Summary & Reference File (PDF)
[1] https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/economy/national-accounts/australian-national-accounts-national-income-expenditure-and-product/latest-release
[2] https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/labour/employment-and-unemployment/labour-force-australia/latest-release
[3] https://www.rba.gov.au/inflation/measures-cpi.html
[4] https://www.rba.gov.au/cash-rate-target-overview.html
[5] https://www.macrotrends.net/2551/australian-us-dollar-exchange-rate-historical-chart
