Tencent Music

Overview

Tencent Music Entertainment Group

predecessor	China Music Corporation Tencent's QQ Music division
type	Public
former name	China Music Corporation
traded as	nyse: TME (ADS) sehk: 1698
founded	July 2016
products	QQ Music, Kugou, Kuwo, WeSing, Ultimate Music
owners	Tencent (57% with 61.6% Shareholders Voting Right) Pacific Alliance Group (9.1% with 11% Shareholders Voting Right) Spotify (16.47%) CICFH entities (6.1% and 7.4% Shareholders Voting Right) Zhenyu Xie (4% and 4.9% Shareholders Voting Right) Dhanin Chearavanont (4% and 4.7% Shareholders Voting Right)
location	Shenzhen, Guangdong, China
num employees	5,966‡R1R‡
num employees year	December 2021
parent	Tencent Interactive Entertainment Group
revenue	CN¥31.24 billion (2021)‡R1R‡
website	tencentmusic.com

Tencent Music Entertainment Group (TME; ) is a company that develops music streaming services for the Chinese market. Tencent Music's apps include QQ Music, KuGou, Kuwo, and WeSing; which have more than 800 million active users and 120 million paying subscribers.[2][3][4] As of July 2016, Tencent Music's three services held an estimated 56% market share of music streaming services in China.[5]

In the first quarter of 2021, Tencent Music announced it had 60.9 million paying users, up 42.6% compared to the 42.7 million paying users in the first quarter of 2020. In addition, the total number of music streaming users was announced to be 615 million, a drop of 6.4% compared to the first quarter of 2020 (657 million).[6]

History

Charts

Tencent Music currently has four charts: The TME UNI Chart, launched in 2018; the TME Wave Chart, launched in 2020; the TME Korean Chart, launched in 2024; and the TME Physical Album Sales Chart, launched in 2021.[21][22][23][24]

Tencent Music began releasing the first "Chinese Digital Music Annual Report" in 2019 and continues to do so every year.[25] The annual report includes rankings of top songs, albums, and artists from all three charts and an overall Chinese Digital Music ranking based on the comprehensive results from TME UNI Chart and TME Wave Chart.

TME UNI Chart

The name, UNI, is a homophone for "up to you" (由你) in Chinese as this chart is determined by the listeners. The TME UNI Chart contains two lists: Real-time List and Past List. Real-time List shows the top 200 songs and updates every ten minutes. Past List shows the top 100 songs from each charting week, which runs from Monday to Sunday.[26] In 2023, Tencent Music Entertainment Group announced a partnership with Billboard to integrate the TME UNI Chart into Billboard's official Hits of the World collection of global record charts.[27][28]

Eligible songs must be new songs within six weeks of their initial release on Tencent Music's platform and are not part of the following song types:

Songs are ranked based on streaming, social, and sales activity from registered accounts on QQ Music, KuGou Music, KuWo Music, WeSing, Joox, Weibo Music, and Weixin Video Account.

Songs without clear ownership and/or credit to the songwriters
Cover songs without any adaptations
User-generated, demo, trial, and/or incomplete version of songs
Live versions of songs performed during commercial performances, concerts, or television programs
Instrumental and/or background music
Songs with vulgar lyrics and/or content that do not comply with relevant national regulations
Songs released more than three months ago that are later added to Tencent Music's platform

TME Wave Chart

The TME Wave Chart is a monthly ranking of the top songs in China compiled based on scores and recommendations from more than 250 music industry professionals.[29]

TME Korean Chart

The TME Korean Chart ranks the top Korean songs within China based on streaming and sales activity from the platforms QQ Music, KuGou Music, KuWo Music, Polka Dot, and Joox as well as data from Circle Chart and Hanteo Chart.

The TME Korean Chart contains two lists: Real-time List and Past List. Real-time List shows the top 200 songs and updates every ten minutes. Past List shows the top 100 songs from each charting week, which runs from Monday to Sunday. Songs are ranked based on streaming (50%), sales (30%), and social activities (20%). [30]

This chart follows a set of rules based on length of time since a song's release on Tencent Music platform:

Weeks 1-12: Songs are eligible to chart
Weeks 13-26: Songs that fall outside the Top 100 are removed from and cannot reenter the chart
Weeks 27-52: Songs that fall outside the Top 50 are removed from and cannot reenter the chart
Weeks 52 and beyond: Songs that fall outside the Top 25 are removed from and cannot reenter the chart

TME Physical Album Sales Chart

The TME Physical Album Sales Chart is a sales chart that ranks the physical record sales based on data from QQ Music and KuGou Music. It contains four lists: Weekly, Monthly, Annual, and Overall.[31]