Hip-Hop is Most Popular Genre For First Time in History

For the first time in U.S. History, Hip-Hop is now the most popular genre in music, surpassing the previous title-holder of Rock & Roll.

According to Nielsen Music’s mid-year report, which classifies Hip-Hop and R&B within the same category, both genres currently compose 25.1 percent of all music consumed in the United States.

While the digit seems low, it’s the highest, topping Rock & Roll’s value of 23 percent.

When it comes to physical album sales, Rock is still pulling ahead accounting for 40 percent.

But in an era where streaming is king, Hip-Hop/R&B reel in 29 percent of all on-demand streams, contributing significantly to its ranking, and as physical sales wane and streaming grows, it’s likely that this trend will last.

“The first half of 2017 has seen some incredible new benchmarks for the music industry,” said Nielsen’s SVP of Music Industry Insights, David Bakula, in a statement. “The rapid adoption of streaming platforms by consumers has generated engagement with music on a scale that we’ve never seen before.”

While the genre’s dominance has long been fact for most of us, this signals its official transition from an outlet for the silenced to a mainstream phenomenon.