UK music streaming hits high note of 500m songs per week

Ed Sheeran, Mark Ronson and Rihanna helping to drive the boom in audio streams on services such as Spotify, Deezer and Google Play

The revolution in the way we listen to music has passed another landmark, as more than 500m songs were streamed online in the UK in a single week, with Mark Ronson, Ed Sheeran and Rihanna among the most popular artists.

The 505m audio streams in the chart week ending 16 July is the first time the number of weekly streams on services such as Spotify, Deezer and Google Play has topped the half a billion mark - which is nearly double the number of songs streamed a year ago.