Apple Services — Including Apple Music — Record Nearly $4 Billion Quarterly Revenue Hike As Subscriptions Approach 800 Million

Apple Music and other Apple services turned in a material revenue increase during Q4 2021, and their cumulative paid subscriptions approached 800 million. Photo Credit: Laurenz Heymann

Apple’s revenue from services – including Apple Music – hiked by nearly $4 billion during the first quarter of the Cupertino-headquartered company’s 2022 fiscal year.

Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) revealed the multibillion-dollar service-revenue jump and other significant details in its recent Q1 FY 2022 performance analysis. Covering the three months ending on December 25th, 2021, the quarter delivered a staggering $19.52 billion in services revenue for Apple, up about $3.76 billion from the same stretch in 2020.

For reference, Apple’s total quarterly revenue for October, November, and December of 2021 came in at $123.95 billion, compared to $111.44 billion for the corresponding window in 2020.

Interestingly, the Americas brought the largest net-sales boost for Apple during 2021’s final quarter, generating $51.50 billion (up $5.19 billion), compared to $29.75 billion for Europe (up $2.44 billion), $25.78 billion for Greater China (up $4.47 billion), $7.11 billion for Japan (down $1.18 billion), and $9.81 billion for “Rest of Asia Pacific” (up $1.59 billion).

That Apple’s services revenue grew by almost $4 billion during Q1 FY 2022, with material net-sales increases in every listed market except Japan, is worth bearing in mind in the broader context of streaming-service competition.

It’s unclear exactly how many subscribers Apple Music itself boasts, but Apple’s subscription services (including Apple TV+, Apple Fitness+, and more) now have a cumulative total of 785 million accounts – up 165 million during the past 12 months, Apple CFO Luca Maestri indicated during his company’s Q1 FY 2022 earnings call.

“We don’t give out subscriber numbers for Apple TV+,” Apple CEO Tim Cook emphasized when responding to a question on the same call. “What we do do is give out a subscriber number for our subscription number for the total number of subscriptions that we had.”

But it stands to reason that a good portion of the past year’s 165 million new Apple subscribers signed up for Apple Music – which, unlike Spotify, doesn’t offer an ad-supported version. Spotify is set to unveil its own Q4 2021 earnings this coming Wednesday, February 2nd, and the Stockholm-based company added seven million paid users between Q2 and Q3 2021, for a total of 172 million subscribers.

Apple’s revenue and subscriber growth is especially noteworthy because rumors have suggested that Spotify could raise its prices in the U.S. Of course, with ample capital pouring in from device sales, it doesn’t appear that Apple will be compelled to up the monthly cost of Apple Music.

Plus, the company has relayed that many of Q4 2021’s device purchases are attributable to new customers as opposed individuals who upgraded from their existing Apple products – meaning that the business’s scope (and potential Apple Music subscriber base) seems to be expanding rapidly.

“In addition to an outstanding level of sales performance globally, Apple Watch continues to extend its reach, with over two-thirds of customers purchasing an Apple Watch during the quarter being new to the product,” said Maestri.