Shazam Is The Most Consequential Piece Of Music Technology In The Industry, And Here’s Why
It’s impact, relevancy, and usability has been unmatched for the past 20+ years
When I got my first smartphone back in 2010, I felt a portal opened up to another dimension where previously unattainable opportunities and knowledge existed. I couldn’t believe how, to my mind, Samsung and Apple packed computer-level data and information into objects so small.
Each app on my Android was a road map into the world of knowledge that was, up to that point, impossible to capture at such a quick speed. These apps helped me learn new things at the click of button, watch movies instantly, and take photos that rivaled the best digital camera’s on Sony’s roster.
One of the apps that changed my life forever was Shazam.
I remember writing down the songs I would Shazam and looking them up later on YouTube. Up to this point, I had used friends and family members to scream out the name of the song we heard at restaurants or on the radio.
If they didn’t know the song, it was gone for all eternity, like Amelia Earhart. Shazam was like a superpower that we could all tap into — it gave us widespread knowledge of the world’s music and the gift of musical discovery at the blink of an eye.
These days, I use Shazam at least a couple of times a month. It’s developed so well over the last decade and really integrates well with streaming services and artists. Every time I open the app, I’m amazed at how many people are Shazamming all the time. Either we all need better, more deep-rooted musical knowledge, or this app simply fills a need so many of us have.
While millions of people use Shazam, many users don’t know much about the company’s origins or why it’s been such a mainstay in the music industry. In this piece, I want to explore Shazam’s story and help shed light on its significance in the music industry.
Further, I want to make the case for why it’s the most consequential piece of music technology in the world. I also believe it’s going to play a pivotal role in the music industry going forward as well, so it’s important we all understand everything Shazam has given us up to this point.
1.The Backstory of Shazam: In this section, I walk you through Shazam’s birth and growth to the present day.
2.Why the App Is Transformative For Listeners And Musicians: In this section, I describe three different ways Shazam has had a transformative impact on music fans and musicians.
3.How The App Has Shaped My Life: In this section, I share three personal stories involving the app to demonstrates the utility of the app in several different circumstances in everyday life.
4.Shazam’s Future Impact: In this section I make some predictions about the future of the company and how it will effect the music industry and listener habits moving forward.
5.Double Down On What Makes Shazam Impactful And User-friendly — In this summary section, I reinforce the article's major points and provide some lasting wisdom for the staff and leadership of the Shazam app.
The Backstory of Shazam
Shazam was started by four friends who shared a common dream. They were motivated by the need to help people identify songs they heard worldwide. Chris Barton, Philip Inghelbrecht, Dhiraj Mukherjee, and Avery Wang came from different backgrounds and contributed different skills to the company. From internet consulting to digital signaling expertise, the guys created a well-rounded business that addressed a need largely expressed by people over the past decade.
Unfortunately, the crew was about five years ahead of the cell phone industry. In 2002, they released their first product by requesting people call a number to capture a song specifically on the radio for later information about the song’s credits.
The next ten years featured Shazam growing astronomically thanks to deliberate rounds of venture capital funding and B2B licensing. By 2018, Apple had bought the company for $400 million and further expanded into new phone marketplaces and regions worldwide. To date, 70 billion songs have been recognized through Shazam in over 200 countries.
(Shazam’s B2B licensing with companies like Svaan, Apple, and Beatport helped it find new users and expand the impact of its progressive music identification technology.)
Why The App Is Transformative For Listeners And Musicians
Speed: Shazam’s speed is one of its most redeemable qualities. It feels like it pulls up results instantly because it almost does. According to Shazam it will identify a song “in an instant” and some sites have verified that it only takes the platform 10 to 20 seconds to recognize a song and display its information to the user.
These lightning-fast results represent the company’s commitment to its customers and desire to stay at the cutting edge of the latest audio fingerprint technology.
B2B Licensing: B2B licensing was not a natural thing for the Shazam founders. While they struggled to formulate valuable and productive relationships with beneficial partners their long term success has separated them from their competitors.
Integrating Shazam into Apple’s App Store changed Shazam’s future forever by making it a necessity for iPhone users. Since and most notably with Snap Chat Shazam has found new ways to make itself visible for a greater number of technology savvy audiences who love music and will quickly learn how to use their product.
Music Database: The engine to Shazam’s success is above all else its expansive and ever growing database. With a library of songs stretching far past 10 billion at this point there’s good reason to see why the app feels like its all-knowing. On the backend the company has done a very smart job frequently partnering with new companies frequently to both increase their user base and build out their audio database.
For instance, their 2024 partnership with the streaming giant Svaan helped Shazam engage hundreds of millions of new users in South Asia as they discover more of their favorite regional artists in their local languages. The sky is not the limit for Shazam, they are reaching for the stars.
How The App Has Shaped My Life
Building Community: Over ten years ago, back in college, I used to activate Shazam whenever I was out with my friends. We shared playlists and songs with one another, so each week, we would go fishing for songs.
Maybe the songs played over the speakers in the dining hall or a shopping center we visited over the weekend. By the beginning of the week, we would send the newly discovered song to each other and have a whole new set of tunes to enjoy.
Confirmation Of Strangers’ Opinions: When my friend and I visited Wyoming this past summer, we visited one particularly cute handcrafts gift stop in downtown Jackson Hole. While we were looking around and touching little painted cups and wood-beaded necklaces, a song was playing across the entire room. I immediately asked the cashier if they knew who was singing the song. In response, he gave us his best guess but wasn’t too sure about it. Phone in hand, I clicked on the Shazam app and waited for our prayers to be answered.
Unfortunately, we were in a dead zone and lacked internet access. When this happens, the song is being captured but the app can’t send you the song yet until after you get internet. I wrote the cashier’s guess in my notes app and left the store. Later, when I got internet back at our hotel, Shazam sent me a notification, and our prayers were answered — the cashier was right on the money, with the correct artists and song title!
Global Reach: A few years back, I was on a work trip in Ghana, where I heard new music everywhere. My knowledge of afrobeats and amapiano is pretty strong, but I couldn’t even make heads or tales with the tunes. Many regional artists had not yet entered the Western market, so very little Burna Boy, WizKid, or Tems was playing. Only knowing a few Ghanaians through work and not being around them always left me with one option: Shazam.
I was Shazamming left and right at the mall near my hotel and in my taxis, picking up a ton of awesome songs that I still frequent to this day. I found artists that would have been very hard, if not impossible, to discover on American-centric algorithms on streaming platforms back home. That trip was special for so many reasons, and Shazam helped me keep the songs that are forever associated with the timeless trip.
(With audio fingerprinting technology, Shazam can match the songs users are listening to with the millions of tracks it hosts in its database.)
Shazam’s Future Impact
Will Continue To Be A Hub To Foresee Future Music Trends: Record labels and radio stations use Shazam to identify up-and-coming artists and growing music trends. Currently, artists use Shazam to help identify where their music is spreading and who is discovering it at any given time. It also allows artists to learn what songs do well and where they are doing well, which is very helpful for touring purposes.
Apple Music, for instance, found that several tunes, including Fireboy DML’s Peru and Wizkid’s Essence, were exploding on their global Shazam charts before they seriously impacted their Apple music charts. In the future, Shazam will most likely play an even greater role in the new wave of independent artists who need to find ways to promote and market their work in more targeted ways due to limited budgets.
Potential Rise For Tough Competition: TikTok’s Sound Search and Google’s Assistant are targeting Shazam’s dominance in the music discovery market. Both platforms are giants and have much bigger user bases than Spotify. If they want to invest in this market and compete seriously with Shazam, there may be a serious battle for territory in the coming years. Fortunately, Shazam has market experience and user loyalty, but nothing in business is promised.
Supporting Artist Discoverability and Monetization: While artists can’t directly get paid through the Shazam app, it has allowed them to upload their tour schedules and streaming sites so fans can tap into both after discovering their music. Therefore, Shazam is dedicated to supporting artists who benefit from their authentic discoverability moments with listeners.
This feature by Shazam demonstrates their commitment to artists making a living off of their songs, especially smaller artists who depend on individual fan sales and concert tickets to sustain themselves.
(Thanks to their success and popularity, Shazam has even expanded into the game show space with Beat Shazam.)
Double Down On What Makes Shazam Impactful And User-friendly
Shazam has become one of the most significant pieces of music technology in the 21st century. The company solved an age-old question many of us had, but few believed it could be solved. Thanks to the minds of Chris Barton, Philip Inghelbrecht, Dhiraj Mukherjee, and Avery Wang, we can now learn what song we’re listening to anywhere at the click of a button.
The technology moves so fast that it almost feels like magic. In this piece, we discussed three crucial elements of the app that made it transformative for the music industry:
Speed: Shazam recognizes your song nearly instantly.
B2B Business Licensing: Through its private partnerships, Shazam has continued to find its way in front of new users and expanded its global reach.
Music Database: Shazam’s gigantic database of songs gives it the glow of being all-knowing.
Shazam has also meant a lot to me. Whether I was in a gift shop in Jackson Hole or a taxi in Accra, Shazam was there when I needed it most. Therefore, Shazam has helped shape the sound of my travels because it helped me identify the songs and save them on my phone. Shazam is a memory enhancer.
As a business, Shazam is focused on growing its users globally through important partnerships. In the future, I foresee the following peaks and roadblocks for the company as it continues to dominate the field virtually unmatched:
Will continue to be a hub to foresee future music trends: Users will remain on the app to search for music that is new to them. This will in turn help artist learn where their growing fanbases are located.
Potential rise for tough competition: Google’s Assistant and TikTok Search are realistic competitors in the space that Shazam needs to be aware of and respond accordingly to.
Supporting artist discoverability and monetization: Shazam indirectly supports artists' monetary development through their integration into artists' streaming, tour, and merch accounts.
Unlike many music streaming apps and social networking platforms, Shazam has remained as simple as possible for the user experience. Therefore, if it’s going to succeed and continue to provide extreme value to its customers, it will need to keep doing what it does best in the most basic way. The app is brilliant because it does so much in the backend but feels seamless for the user. That’s its superpower. It needs to keep it.
(In this playlist, I share my 20 most recent Shazammed tunes. Enjoy the music discovery!)
Thank you for reading! If you would like to continue supporting independent journalism and content like this consider becoming a paid subscriber to my newsletter today. :)
Great read. My husband uses SoundHound. What are the differences? I wonder if they are equally as accurate or not? 🧐