Anghami ( ar, أنغامي, anɣāmī) is the first legal music streaming platform and digital distribution company in the

Arab world The Arab world ( ar, اَلْعَالَمُ الْعَرَبِيُّ '), formally the Arab homeland ( '), also known as the Arab nation ( '), the Arabsphere, or the Arab states, refers to a vast group of countries, mainly located in Western As ...

. It launched in November 2011 in Lebanon, providing unlimited Arabic and international music to stream and download for offline mode. It is designed for the

Middle East The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Province), East Thrace (Europea ...

and

North Africa North Africa, or Northern Africa is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region, and it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of Mauritania in ...

to provide the largest music catalog of licensed content from the major Arabic labels such as

Melody A melody (from Greek language, Greek μελῳδία, ''melōidía'', "singing, chanting"), also tune, voice or line, is a Linearity#Music, linear succession of musical tones that the listener perceives as a single entity. In its most liter ...

Mazzika Mazzika Group ( ar, مزيكا, lit=Music) is a vertically integrated entertainment company founded in Egypt, focused on repackaging and distribution of Arabic content to Arabic-speaking communities and audiences interested in Arab-related conte ...

, Platinum Records and many other

independent label An independent record label (or indie label) is a record label that operates without the funding or distribution of major record labels; they are a type of small- to medium-sized enterprise, or SME. The labels and artists are often represent ...

s, in addition to international majors labels such as

Sony , commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professional ...

, Universal and

Warner Music Group Warner Music Group Corp. ( d.b.a. Warner Music Group, commonly abbreviated as WMG) is an American multinational entertainment and record label conglomerate headquartered in New York City. It is one of the " big three" recording companies and t ...

. Anghami is one of the largest digital music ventures in the Middle East, seed funded by MEVP.

History

The goal of Anghami was to reduce

music piracy Music piracy is the copying and distributing of recordings of a piece of music for which the rights owners (composer, recording artist, or copyright-holding record company) did not give consent. In the contemporary legal environment, it is a form ...

in the Arab world. The service was meant to serve as an alternative to piracy. Anghami was founded by Eddy Maroun, and Elie Habib in Lebanon, launched initially as a mobile only app with the slogan "The idea is that everywhere you go, you’ll find your music". One of Anghami's app features is

Dolby Dolby Laboratories, Inc. (often shortened to Dolby Labs and known simply as Dolby) is an American company specializing in audio noise reduction, audio encoding/compression, spatial audio, and HDR imaging. Dolby licenses its technologies to ...

Pulse encoding, which reduces the file size of streamed music for faster and reliable online streaming when the internet

bandwidth Bandwidth commonly refers to: * Bandwidth (signal processing) or ''analog bandwidth'', ''frequency bandwidth'', or ''radio bandwidth'', a measure of the width of a frequency range * Bandwidth (computing), the rate of data transfer, bit rate or thr ...

is fluctuating. Anghami has more than 35 telecom partners. Shortly after the partnership between Anghami and mobile operators in MENA has been agreed few months after launching, the service experienced rapid growth with 1 million registered users four months after the launch. However, the next million was reached in three months, mainly after partnering with the major media player MBC Group

Middle East Broadcasting Center MBC Group ( ar, مجموعة إم بي سي), is a Saudi media conglomerate based in the Middle East and North Africa region. Launched in London in 1991, the company moved to its headquarters to Dubai in 2002 then moved to Riyadh in 2022. MBC ...

that featured Anghami in one of its most successful TV shows ''

Arab Idol ''Arab Idol'' is an Arabic television show, based on the popular British show ''Pop Idol'' created by Simon Fuller's 19 Entertainment and developed by Fremantle Media and recorded in Beirut, Lebanon. The first season premiered on 9 December 201 ...

''. In 2013, Anghami partnered with

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Mosk ...

By 2017, Anghami reached 30 million listeners, with 75% of users being in the Arab region. In 2019, Anghami's founder revealed in an interview that Anghami has 21 million monthly active users and 1 million paying subscribers. In March 2021, Anghami became the first Arabic technology company to list on New York’s Nasdaq through a Special Purpose Acquisition Company (SPAC) merger with Vistas Media Acquisition Company and the company was valued at between $220 million and $230 million. In August 2021, Anghami announced plans to launch a new hybrid entertainment venue named the Anghami Lab in multiple cities worldwide, including

Dubai Dubai (, ; ar, دبي, translit=Dubayy, , ) is the most populous city in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the capital of the Emirate of Dubai, the most populated of the 7 emirates of the United Arab Emirates.The Government and Politics o ...

Riyadh Riyadh (, ar, الرياض, 'ar-Riyāḍ, lit.: 'The Gardens' Najdi pronunciation: ), formerly known as Hajr al-Yamamah, is the capital and largest city of Saudi Arabia. It is also the capital of the Riyadh Province and the centre of the ...

Jeddah Jeddah ( ), also spelled Jedda, Jiddah or Jidda ( ; ar, , Jidda, ), is a city in the Hejaz region of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) and the country's commercial center. Established in the 6th century BC as a fishing village, Jeddah's promi ...

Cairo Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the largest urban agglomeration in Africa, the Arab world and the Middle East: The Greater Cairo metro ...

Beirut Beirut, french: Beyrouth is the capital and largest city of Lebanon. , Greater Beirut has a population of 2.5 million, which makes it the third-largest city in the Levant region. The city is situated on a peninsula at the midpoint of ...

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a major s ...

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * ...

and

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

References

External links

Official website
{{Music streaming services Middle Eastern music Music streaming services North African music 2012 establishments in Lebanon 2012 software Android (operating system) software IOS software Windows Phone software Online music stores of Lebanon Symbian software Jukebox-style media players Mass media companies established in 2012 Lebanese brands Companies listed on the Nasdaq Special-purpose acquisition companies

History

See also

References

External links